


The Twin-Fingered God

by QuickYoke



Series: The Wonder Years of the Greatest Generation [4]
Category: Agent Carter (TV), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-14
Updated: 2015-08-28
Packaged: 2018-03-22 20:42:30
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 10
Words: 32,181
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3742918
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/QuickYoke/pseuds/QuickYoke
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Peggy and Angie are trying to finally settle down and have a family. Too bad Ragnarok looms on the horizon. A sequel to "The Dartboard for Witches"</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

_You wound a ball of twine around my eyes, then pinned_  
_the end between my fingers._

 _You gowned me in white tissue_  
_like a hothouse nectarine._

 _The furtive door at last unbarred, I was_  
_amazed at the garden’s suggestion_

 _throating from vining flower-walls_  
_in breaths that quickened with mine._

 _How long I lingered beneath_  
_sun awnings and a stone-and-mortar sky,_

 _only you know. For when I found the throne room_  
_festooned with pelvis bones,_

 _the twin-fingered god on whose nether lip I hung_  
_a kiss, a crape-gartered barb,_

 _was you—you the pursued, yours_  
_the bull’s head draped with fragrant lash-black hair._

_“The Minotaur” – by Peter Kline_

 

* * *

 

The Asgardians had many signs that heralded the end of the universe, but the two they actually received were unexpected.

Lady Sif walked the royal halls to the throne room, and every step rang with purpose. That same purpose with which she wielded her weapons. Shield and sword strapped to her back, her armour glinted a burnished brushed silver in the light of braziers lining the soaring columns. Beneath her feet the ground was still gripped with tremors, little aftershocks from the great grinding and bucking of just an hour previously.

When she entered the throne room, it was empty but for a single occupant in a flowing red cape.

“Thor –” she began.

“That name belongs to me no longer.” He did not turn to greet her or acknowledge her presence in any way.

“Odinson,” she corrected herself, crossing the space to stand beside him, her footsteps striking the stone floors with more force. She hated calling him that. He was so much more than the child of the All-Father, “I bear news.”

“Can it possibly be more important than this?” he gestured with his mechanical arm at the rubble all around.

Before them lay the once grand seat of Odin Borson, the All-Father. Just an hour ago it had stood proud and majestic, created from the hilt of the Odinsword, a weapon hundreds of feet in length. Odinsword – also called Ragnarok. To draw it was to prophesy The End.

And it had _moved._

Now it quivered in stone, the source of earthquakes and misgivings across all of Asgard. It was taller than Sif herself, but still able to be drawn by a hand, should it so wish.

Weapons like this had minds of their own.

“The All-Father is dying,” Odinson could not tear his eyes from the sword’s pommel, “His successor has yet to be found, and now _this._ ”

“Odin is not yet dead. He only sleeps,” Sif moved to stand in front of him, forcing him to look at her, “And I believe I may know why the Odinsword has changed.”

At that his gaze flicked sharply to her, “How?”

“Heimdall received a message. A transmission from,” and here her face screwed up in bemusement, “ _Midgard_ , of all places.”

His expression mirrored her own, “Midgard? I was under the impression they still burned fossil fuels. Have they even travelled to space?”

“Two years ago, yes. Though the journey was brief. That is not what concerns me,” her hands clenched, and she took a step closer, voice lowering. One never knew what ears might pry in these halls, “What concerns me is that Heimdall received the message an hour ago. The same time –”

“The same time as the Odinsword’s transformation.” He spoke softly, awed, “That cannot be coincidence.”

“My thoughts exactly. I came as soon as I discovered it.”

“But what did the message say?” he pressed.

Sif raised her shoulders in a helpless shrug, “Therein lies yet another mystery. We have no idea.”

He frowned, “Not even Heimdall?”

She shook her head, “He is at as much a loss as I.”

Hefting his dwarven-forged axe, Jarnbjorn, on one broad shoulder, Odinson turned, “Come, my lady. We will unravel this mystery together.”

They strode from the throne room and through the glittering golden streets to the Bifrost. There Heimdall greeted them with a stony nod, unblinking.

“Play me the message,” Odinson demanded, and Heimdall complied.

With a tap of his sword, the message resounded throughout the portal’s walls. It was a dark unintelligible tongue, snapping and guttural all at once, like the flicker of black flame or the slap of bruised offal against cold, unfeeling stone. By the time the message finished, Odinson had a look on his face like he’d bitten into rancid fruit.

“I don’t suppose you have any idea what that meant either?” Sif nudged him with her elbow.

“No. I believe you now. That was,” he shuddered, “most _foul._ ”

“The Bifrost is ready for your departure,” Heimdall assured them, already dragging his sword to open the portal between worlds.

“Thank you,” Odinson joined Sif on the platform, “I apologise for doubting you, old friend.”

“After all these years too,” Heimdall retorted, deadpan. It was as close to a joke Sif had ever heard him utter. She gave him a wry look, which he pretended not to see.

Difficult for the All-Seeing God to achieve, though he ignored her small smile with aplomb.

Heimdall jammed his sword downward, and the air blurred with light. That familiar swooping sensation clutched at Sif’s stomach as they rocketed between planets, her vision a glare of bright colours all blending together until there was just a blinding white. Her legs bent in anticipation of their landing, and when it came she absorbed the impact with ease.

The blazing light faded, and Sif blinked in the sudden darkness. Night had long since cast a veil of stars here. A cool breeze sloughed through the nearby trees. And they were not alone.

In one smooth motion Sif had her shield and sword drawn, dropping into a defensive crouch.

“You!” Odinson pointed with his axe, his brows drawn downward in a fierce scowl, “This was _your_ doing? Explain yourself!”

Thor – the rightful Thor, Sif had to remind herself – rose slowly from where she knelt in the clearing. Mjolnir crackled with energy like a warning in one hand, but the other hand she raised, palm up, “Be at peace, my lord. I am merely here investigating the call. The same as you.”

Reluctant, Sif lowered her weapons, though she did not sheathe them. She never liked being unarmed when in the company of strangers. This may be Thor, but Sif did not know her. She was not sure she wanted to know her either. Sif was many things, but fast friends was not one of them, “You received the message as well?”

Thor shook her head, “No. But I heard it all the same. It brought me here.”

Where ‘here’ was however, was another question entirely. A series of small ruins built into the ground lay not far off. Old fortifications, by the looks of them, though they had not seen battle in some years. Otherwise the trees bristled tall, and hills rolled into the distance.

“How long have you been here?” Odinson asked.

“I arrived only moments before you,” Thor tilted her head, winged helm catching the bluish light from the hammer, “It was deserted then as well.”

Shifting her grip on the hilt of her sword, Sif grinned wickedly, her eyes dark, “If Ragnarok is truly upon us, then let us give chase on this Wild Hunt.”

“You speak in ill-omens, lady,” Thor replied gravely, and even Odinson seemed to agree, if his sombre expression was any indication.

He was always sombre these days. Ever since he lost that damnable hammer. Even now he glanced at it with longing.

“True,” Sif strode off into the night, not waiting to see if the others followed, and her long black hair whipped behind her in the wind, “But what better time to speak ill-omens than at the end of all things?”

 

* * *

 

 

On her rare days off Peggy liked to watch Angie work. It reminded her of better brighter times, when the War had ended, and they had just moved into this apartment, and Angie still couldn’t believe her luck in life, fiddling with copper pipes and other fixtures around the property. Now in 1963, Angie still couldn’t help but fidget with some latest gadget, tongue poking out in concentration as she twisted a red-handled screwdriver, her face gilded by the afternoon sunlight on their patio.

Peggy’s days off had grown only slightly more numerous after that whole Cuba fiasco a year ago. Mostly she took days off to spend more time with Angie. Though if Howard had anything to say about it, she would only be working part time.

“I’m pregnant, not dead,” she had snapped at him when he wouldn’t let the topic go one day at the office. Honestly, the man worried over her like a dog over a bone.

He had raised his hands and backed away warily, “Uh oh. You need saltines and ginger-ale or something weird like that? I’ve been reading books on pregnancy and –”

At that she had chucked a paperweight at him, which he neatly dodged.

“Sir,” Mr. Jarvis had said from his place on the side lines in Peggy’s office, “perhaps it would be more prudent to not antagonise the hormonal pregnant woman?”

“Oh, she’s always like this,” Howard had waved him away.

That being said, she had started taking a few more days off. Not because of the pregnancy – she was hardly into her first trimester, and wouldn’t start showing for weeks still – but because of…

Well. Angie, of course.

After the revelations of a year ago, suddenly their time together felt that much more tenuous. Fleeting was the word that sprang to mind.

“Milk, Ms. Carter?”

“Hmm?” Peggy tore her eyes away from the glow of sunlight caught in Angie’s hair to find Mr. Jarvis handing her a steaming cup of tea, “Yes, thank you.”

She balanced the cup on her fingertips and resumed her watching. Meanwhile Mr. Jarvis settled himself in an armchair in the shade of the apartment with his own cup of tea and a book.

It had become something of a routine, his arrival every other Saturday afternoon. Like clockwork he would rap on their front door bearing some new prize under one arm – a box of fresh-baked chocolate éclairs, or a dark devil’s food cake, tooth-ripeningly rich with a dusting of curly chocolate flakes.

At first Peggy had her suspicions that Mr. Jarvis only came on Howard’s orders, but she soon learned that was not the case. His wife, Anna, had suggested the first visit, and after that everything just sort of fell into place.

Of course when Angie had learned that he baked all the goods personally, the pair enthusiastically swapped recipes and tips, and soon the Saturdays devolved into baking sessions that actually threatened Peggy’s waistline. Something she hadn’t had to worry about since joining the British Armed Forces and introducing a work-out regime that killed lipids faster than a Panzerfaust roasted tanks.

Thankfully – for Peggy’s waistline but not necessarily for her taste buds – that all ended the day Jarvis brought them a bird-feeder.

It was a bizarre thing to act as a housewarming gift, but it had been a fast success. Immediately Angie had dropped the piping bag full of icing on the kitchen countertop, and torn into the feeder, taking it apart and putting it back together right there on the tile floors.

“Does she always do this with gifts?” Mr. Jarvis had asked Peggy aside, looking concerned for Angie’s mental well-being, “Or is it just with the ones she particularly dislikes?”

“Oh, no! It means she likes it.” Peggy had assured him with a pat to his arm.

He had given her this slow look, as though he were suddenly doubting _her_ sanity now for her choice in life partners. In response she had just hidden a grin by sipping her tea.

As it turned out, the bird-feeder was one of those squirrel proof contraptions that the bird had to ‘solve’ like a puzzle in order to receive a tasty prize. Angie had never been able to get her hands on one, and – well. As soon as she did, it was all downhill from there.

Now every other weekend she designed and created increasingly complex puzzle box feeders for the birds that congregated on the patio railing. Their apartment had grown so popular with the local wildlife – particularly with the cleverer corvids – that from the outside it look like a parliament fringed with so many rooks and crows.

Angie irritably waved away a few ever-hopeful pigeons blocking her light, and continued working on the newest feeder. Two massive ravens swooped down and perched behind her, cocking their heads inquisitively at Angie’s persistent compulsive tinkering.

Peggy blew across the top of her tea and took a tentative sip, “Do you enjoy your job, Mr. Jarvis?”

The rustle of pages behind her, and he replied with, “Do you?’

She hummed, “I can’t really imagine myself doing anything else, to be perfectly honest.”

“It seems you already have the answer to your question, then.”

Still watching Angie tinker, Peggy continued, “I imagine being Howard’s butler would be trying on the best of days.”

“No more so than being his business partner,” Mr. Jarvis replied dryly.

Peggy snorted and shook her head, “Do you have a witty retort for everything? Or do you have to practice them in the mirror every evening?”

“The former,” he placed his own cup of tea back onto its saucer with a gentle click of porcelain, “It’s a part of my job description, I’m afraid. Can’t have Mr. Stark’s guest go unentertained, after all.”

He sounded as if he were only half-joking.

Angie had finished the latest bird feeder and set it up for a trial run. One of the two ravens stole her screwdriver when she wasn’t looking, and while she was distracted the other simply pried apart the back panel of the feeder. Seed spilled everywhere, and all of the birds dove on it like sharks in blooded water. The two ravens in question however, leapt back and ruffled their feathers smugly.

“Son of a –!” Angie waved her arms in a failed attempt to scare the birds off. The two ravens didn’t budge, though many of the other birds squawked and careened away. She pointed at the ravens with her screwdriver and threatened, “You’ll pay for that, you troublemakers!”

“Don’t talk to the birds, Angie,” Peggy called, cupping the tea’s warmth in her palms, “People think we’re odd enough as it is.”

“That they do,” Mr. Jarvis muttered under his breath.

“I heard that,” Peggy turned her head only enough to arch an eyebrow at him.

He cleared his throat and pretended to busy himself by flicking to a new page of his book.

On the other hand Angie ignored them both. She picked up the feeder and dumped all the seed with a mournful shake. Heaving a sigh she retreated out of the sunlight and back into the apartment. The two ravens tried to follow, but she shut the glass door on them so that they had to flare their wings in order to keep from crashing.

Peggy pointed with her chin to the ravens, “Friends of yours?”

“They wish,” Angie grumbled, throwing a glare over her shoulder, “Showed up two weeks ago on the patio, and have made my Saturdays hell ever since.”

“Well, if you’re looking for someone to blame, I hear that fulfils part of Mr. Jarvis’ job description,” Peggy said wryly, turning to gauge his reaction, “He did start this whole tradition after all.”

He looked up slowly from his book with a thousand yard stare. Peggy fought back a grin.

“Yeah! Thanks a lot, Mr. Fancy!” Angie played along.

“If I wanted to spend my Saturdays being unfairly berated, I would spend them with Mr. Stark’s amorous ex-admirers,” he retorted, primly re-crossing his legs.

“I’m telling him you said that,” Angie warned.

“Please do.”

With a huff of laughter Angie put down the ruined bird feeder and jerked her head to the kitchen, “C’mon. You were going to teach me how to make tarte Tatin.”

“That I was.”

Putting his book down, Mr. Jarvis stood and made to follow her into the kitchen. As he passed by the sitting-room telephone on the way though, it rang.

He answered it, “Carter residence.”

Peggy waved him down and whispered, “You don’t have to answer the phones for us!”

She didn’t chasten him for the whole ‘Carter residence’ thing either. Though she would later. ‘Carter residence,’ indeed.

Not flustered in the slightest, he held the receiver out to her, “It’s for you, Ms. Carter.”

Crossing the room, she swatted him away, “Get thee to a kitchen, man!” she scolded playfully before putting the phone to her ear, “Carter speaking.”

_“Hey there, Grandma.”_

Peggy froze. It had been almost a year, but that voice was unmistakable, “Natasha. I can’t say it’s a pleasure to hear from you again.”

_“How’s pregnancy treating you?”_

Eyes narrowing, Peggy growled, “No games. What do you want?”

For a long moment the line was quiet. Then Natasha said just one word.

 _“Amnesty.”_  

 


	2. Chapter 2

The signal drew them east. The Asgardian trio tramped on foot over sloping hills all through the night, saying very little. That was probably for the best. Sif did not know if she could take Odinson and Thor’s awkward mumblings as they skirted around the fact that one of them had something the other desperately wanted.

It felt like herding bilgesnipes, or spending time with petulant children. Neither activities Sif particularly liked, to say the least. Especially children. She never knew how to act around children.

She led the group, maintaining a gruelling pace she knew her companions could keep without difficulty. Only once did they cross paths with humans, and they received stares, the humans slowing down their vehicle to squint at them across the field through the darkness. As luck would have it they went unimpeded. Even so Sif kept off the beaten track as much as she could, preferring to pursue the signal as the raven flies.

“This would go much more quickly were we to fly to our destination.” Thor brandished Mjolnir, swirling it around her wrist so that it arced through the air.

Odinson did not seem opposed to the idea – if only to taste the thrill of Mjolnir’s flight second hand – but at the fore of the company Sif growled, “I’ll not cling to the ends of your cape and be dragged about like a fool.”

“As you wish, my lady,” Thor bowed her head respectfully.

The brooch pinning Odinson’s cloak in place at his shoulder hummed to life, and Heimdall’s voice rumbled softly yet clearly, “The signal tracks to the northeast. You are close.”

“Finally,” Sif hefted sword and shield, pushing onward with renewed vigour.

Behind her Thor murmured to Odinson, “My most sincere condolences for your father.”

“Thank you.”

Sif rolled her eyes, “He is not dead yet.” She reminded them. They seemed intent on ignoring her practicality and remaining sombre regardless.

Odinson shook his head, glum, and his hands twisted around the hilt of Jarnbjorn, “It is only a matter of time. His battle with the demon, Surtur, drained him utterly, and now he succumbs in his sleep.” He looked off to the horizon, tinged with the grey dull hints of a distant dawn, and his eyes were almost _misty,_ “First Mjolnir, and now I am not worthy to be Odin’s successor either. Am I doomed to have no name at all?”

That did it.

Abruptly Sif rounded on him, and her sword flashed to his throat, “You try my patience!” she snapped, “It is bad enough you pine after that hammer, now you sulk like a cow-eyed harpy! By my hand, if you will not cease this useless blubbering, I will happily end your suffering for you!”

Both he and Thor gaped at her, speechless.

Satisfied with her work, Sif swung back around and stormed off, sword still clenched in her fist. Thor and Odinson exchanged glances, then followed without another word. In minutes they were approaching the signal at last.

It came from a small stone house, its blackened windows unlit, and with no signs of life or movement inside. Sif’s gaze swept the landscape for sights of a trap before barging in, but as soon as she was about start forward on their final approach, a vehicle lumbered around the corner and down the road. It stopped not far from the dwelling, its lights casting a harsh glow across old stone and wood.

Heimdall spoke through the brooch once more, but this time he sounded harsh, urgent, “There’s been a breach in Asgard’s security. The All-Mother has been attacked, and the Treasure Room ransacked.”

Odinson paled, “Is she alright?”

There was a pause during which all three held their breath, “She lives.” Heimdall said at last, “Her injuries are not severe. She happened upon the thief while they were in the thick of villainy.”

“What was stolen?” Thor asked.

When Heimdall told them, they all blanched.

Sif had thought the end of the universe couldn’t get any worse. Oh, how wrong she was.

 

* * *

 

 

Angie saw the trip as an excuse to test out her newest gadget, while Yelena saw it as an excuse to try to murder Natasha.

Not that either of them needed an excuse for those things.

“How can you think about leaving me behind? Last I looked: _I_ saved _your_ sorry tuckus from Nat, not the other way ‘round. Besides! Look at this!” Angie held up her arm, sheathed in a metallic glove like a second skin, “Isn’t it awesome? I need to test it in the field!”

“While those are all valid points,” Peggy replied, her tone dry, “my answer is still no.”

They were in Peggy’s office at SHIELD headquarters in Manhattan. While they spoke Peggy gathered materials into a canvas bag for her trip to Flanders, where Natasha had requested a meeting.

“And what about me?” Yelena asked from where she darkened Peggy’s doorstep, arms crossed, as icy as ever, “I’m your Soviet advisor. Isn’t this exactly why you hired me?”

“Precisely,” Peggy dragged the canvas bag from her office and down to the locker rooms, the other two trailing close behind her through the rows of desks, “I brought you into the fold to _advise_ me. Not to kill every Soviet I have meetings with.”

“I haven’t killed anyone. Yet.” Yelena said it like she was insulted Peggy would accuse her of such a thing.

“Oh, gold star for you!” Angie quipped.

Yelena shot her a warning look that washed off Angie like water from a duck’s back.

“What information does Nat have, anyway?” Angie asked, almost tripping on Peggy’s bag she was walking so close behind her.

“She wouldn’t say,” Peggy admitted.

“Trap!” Yelena said.

Peggy shot her an annoyed look over her shoulder, “We don’t know that.”

“Did she say anything else?” Angie pressed.

With a sigh, Peggy opened the locker room by leaning on the swinging door with her back and heaved her bag through, “She said I wouldn’t believe her.”

“Trap!” Yelena drawled again in a sing-song voice.

“Would you stop that?” Peggy snapped.

“It’s my job to give you my expert opinion on Soviet matters.” Yelena pushed through the door after her, not bothering to keep it open for Angie, “This is my expert opinion.”

Forced to slap the door open to keep it from shutting in her face, Angie scowled at the back of Yelena’s head.

“Well, in the future you will refrain from doing it in song,” Peggy said, making her way to her designated locker, “I’ll even write it into your contract if I have to.”

“What’ll you do if your car breaks down on the Belgian border, huh?” Angie leaned on the locker next to Peggy’s, “I hope your Flemish is good, Peg.”

“ _My_ Flemish is excellent, by the way,” Yelena point out.

Peggy pulled out an extra set of tactical clothes from her locker, including three pairs of socks too many for the length of trip she had planned. In her experience, foot hygiene was priority number one right after a clean water supply, “My Flemish is passable, and I’ve learned enough about cars to get by, Angie.” She slammed the locker shut, “How could I possibly do otherwise, living with you for all these years?”

When she turned around however, it was to find that both Angie and Yelena had bags at their feet. Peggy pointed, “Those better not be what I think they are.”

“If you think they’re our bags for the trip, then yes.” Angie gave her own canvas bag a little kick for good measure, her metal leg hitting something hard and clanking.

“We packed earlier this morning,” Yelena added.

Of course they had.

Peggy pinched the bridge of her nose and breathed deeply.

Why did she even try anymore?

On the bright side at least there was no possible way she could be bored on the flight.

“Tell me more about your latest gadget,” she asked Angie after the airhostess handed her a glass of orange juice with a slice of orange as a garnish. It was only a matter of time until Angie told her all about it anyway. And she also happened to enjoy watching the way Angie’s face flushed and her eyes sparkled when she grew particularly passionate about her latest work.

It reminded Peggy of times when she was desperate for Angie to tell her all about planes and engines. For Angie to remind her about normal times. Not that any times in their lives had been very ‘normal’ so to speak. But more normal than this.

Or perhaps this was normal: sitting with Angie in a jet of her own design, listening to Angie’s incessant babble while they soared across the Atlantic, Yelena Belova requesting a gin martini from the pretty air hostess.

_Normal._

What a sobering thought.

“I’m so glad you asked,” Angie gushed. She held out her forearm and pressed a knob on her inner wrist, lighting up a series of dials and buttons all across the smooth metallic surface, “I call it ‘The Gauntlet.’ It’s a completely wireless interface that allows me to manually override my leg’s programming should anything go wrong. Like that time Serov incapacitated me back in Bolivia.”

Yelena nodded, “That was not so good.”

“Yeah, for you too,” Angie shot back, “Anyway, it gives me a lot more fine motor control when in a pinch.”

Peggy bit into the orange garnish, chewing away. She wouldn’t call the oranges a ‘craving’ but they certainly were nice. Perhaps a little nicer than they had been before pregnancy. Just a tad, “In other words: no more submachine gun misfires?”

Angie rolled her eyes, “No more submachine gun misfires. Promise.”

Yelena arched an incredulous eyebrow at them over her chilled glass.

“Don’t even look at me,” Angie growled at her, “Or should we tell Peggy about your little rocket failure last month?”

“Your what now?” Peggy’s gaze hardened.

Yelena smiled and insisted in her sweetest and most syrupy voice, “Nobody was hurt. I swear on my mother’s grave.”

“You mean you didn’t spring from the Devil’s loins fully formed?” Peggy stuffed the orange rind back into her drink and took a sip, “I’m shocked.”

Yelena just raked her gaze over Peggy and purred, “Speaking of loins –”

 _“No.”_ Angie tapped a button on her glove, and immediately a flat, blunt blade jutted over her knuckles, crackling with electricity like a taser.

Pouting, Yelena crossed her arms and looked out the window, lower lip jutting out, “Spoilsport. You used to be fun, Angie.”

Angie tapped the button again, and the taser retracted.

“I think I’m starting to like that glove of yours,” Peggy murmured.

“ _Gauntlet_ ,” Angie corrected with a grin, “And thank you!”

Without too much trouble they landed and picked up a jeep waiting for them, heading north. Peggy said ‘not too much’ because there was, in fact, a little mishap where the car broke down a quarter of the way to their rendezvous point with Natasha. Or rather, Peggy’s poor driving encouraged the car to break down.

In other words Peggy crashed. Though she refused to admit it.

“Watch out for the –” Angie pointed, but it was too late.

One of the front wheels twisted up in a pot hole the size of New Jersey, and the whole car lurched to a halt. Peggy gaped, still gripping the wheel.

“How did you not see that?” Yelena prodded Peggy’s shoulder.

Glaring, Peggy shrugged her hand off, “What have I said about the touching?”

Yelena rolled her eyes -- well, _eye_ , singular, the other hidden away behind a black patch -- and slumped back in her seat, as melodramatic as ever. Honestly it felt like hauling a teenager around. On the other hand Angie was already hauling the spare tyre from the boot in one hand. Bless her. The other hand she used to tap on her leg, and a lug wrench popped out of her mechanical thigh.

Good lord.

“How many tools do you have stored away in that thing?” Peggy asked, leaning out the window to admire Angie’s shoulders as she worked.

“Including this? Fifty-seven.” Angie grunted, turning the lug wrench, “The tread on these are crap, by the way.”

“Do you want any help?” Peggy asked, already reaching for the door handle.

But Angie waved her away, “Nah. I got this.”

Not long later Angie was clambering back into the front passenger seat, dusting off her hands, “Good to go!” And they were on their way again.

“Now we just need to find someone for Yelena to converse with in Flemish, and we’ll already have made our point,” Angie said smugly as they continued trundling along the dirty road into the night.

Peggy would rather swallow a spare tyre bolt.

As it turned out they were flagged down by another vehicle passing the other direction, which flashed its lights and slowed as it passed with its window rolled down. A farmer and what appeared to be her son in the passenger seat called out a greeting and began yammering away in rapid-fire Flemish. Peggy stared blankly, only catching every other word.

With a smirk that set Peggy’s teeth on edge, Yelena leaned forward in her seat, “Looks like my services are required after all.”

Peggy’s knuckles flashed white around the steering wheel, and she grit her teeth so hard her jaw creaked.

Yelena spoke with the farmers only for a few moments before she leaned back in her seat, “They saw some strange people making their way northeast of here, and thought we should know.”

Peggy punched the jeep into gear and grumbled, “Why on earth would they want us to know that?”

Yelena shrugged, “This is rural country. People tend to be chattier and look out for each other.”

“On the plus side,” Angie added, “they must think we’re locals.”

“What did they mean by strange?” Peggy asked, “Could it be a set up?”

“I’m not sure,” Yelena admitted, “She just said they were on foot and wearing strange clothes.”

Peggy’s whole body swayed from another small series of pot holes littering the road, “Alright, then. Be prepared for anything.”

Apparently she didn’t need to tell them twice. Angie was reaching for her SIG P210, and Yelena already had an M16 assault rifle held slackly against her shoulder, pointed into the car floor. Where she had pulled it from, Peggy didn’t have a clue. Air, perhaps.

They pulled up just far away from the rendezvous point that Peggy felt she could safely skid away from the scene in case of an ambush. An old stone house crouched, unlit and uninhabited, beside a thicket of dense trees.

Angie craned her neck, “Do you see Nat anywhere?”

“There,” Peggy cocked her Walther PPK. A familiar shock of red hair moved around the building, shielding her from the treeline.

Now, when Peggy had said ‘be prepared for anything’ she hadn’t expected that to include a fully armoured warrior leaping onto the hood of the jeep and driving a sword clean through the engine block.

“Jesus H. Christ!” Angie yelped, pistol held shakily in front of her.

If the warrior was alarmed at having three firearms pointed at her face, she gave no indication of it. The hood of the car dented beneath her weight, and her long black hair was a wild tangle over her shoulders. She looked straight down the three barrels aimed at her, and her eyes flashed, dark.

“Step out with your hands raised, thieves!” She commanded, sword still planted into the engine, shield held at her side, “Or I will have your heads!”

“I for one vote we do as she says,” Angie squeaked.

In the backseat Yelena’s hand tightened on her rifle, “I vote we shoot her.”

“No shooting!” Peggy scolded, lowering her own gun slowly.

Carefully she exited the jeep, hands held up in front of her. She still held onto her pistol, however. As she did so two more warriors emerged from the nearby trees, crossing the space with swift long-legged gaits. One hefted an axe as long as Peggy was tall, and the other a hammer that sparked.

“You there! Skulking in the dark!” the man barked, holding his axe towards the house, “Come out where I can see you!”

Natasha emerged, palms splayed to show that she bore no weapons.

The warrior atop the car tugged her sword free and stepped down, “Is this another one of your accomplices?” she demanded, pinning Peggy to the spot with the force of her glare, “Speak quickly!”

Angie and Yelena came to stand at Peggy’s side. Angie nervously. Yelena reluctant and surly.

“We are not thieves,” Peggy tried for calm, keeping her voice level and low, “We came here at her direction for information. Nothing more.”

“What information?” the woman with the hammer asked, face concealed by a winged helm.

“Yes – what information, Natalia?” Yelena snapped.

The man hauled Natasha over by her upper arm and corralled her with the rest of them. Flicking back a few wayward strands of hair, Natasha straightened, “I brought you here to see for yourselves, or you wouldn’t believe me.”

Angie tipped her head back and groaned, “Can someone please start making sense? Preferably soon?”

Natasha opened her mouth to reply, but before she could do so the ground began to rumble. Behind them the small stone house began to shake. Lurid streaks of shadow – all purple and black and bronze as the sea – bled from the windows, weeping down the walls, and hissing as it dissolved timber and stone alike. The rumble reached a crescendo like a congregation speaking in tongues, a garbled demonic chant.

Then without warning it stopped.

“The signal has gone,” a deep voice announced from the pin at the man’s shoulder.

Natasha swore vehemently to herself in Russian.

“Where has the signal gone now, Heimdall?” the man asked.

“Nowhere. It is gone.”

Stepping forward, Natasha jabbed a finger into the man’s bare chest, “If it weren’t for you idiots, we could have caught him!”

At that the dark-haired woman swung her sword around until it pressed into the soft skin of Natasha’s throat, “Caught who?” she snarled.

Natasha batted the blade away with the flat of her hand, “Ivan Serov.”

A hush.

But that was -

"Impossible," Yelena snapped, “Ivan Serov is dead. I was there when it happened.”

“Yeah, you think I don’t know that?” Natasha sneered, “That’s why I brought you here, _ved’ma_.”

Yelena’s expression grey icy and distant, and she took a menacing step forward. Peggy threw her arm out and caught Yelena in the chest before she could do anything rash.

“Peace!” the warrior bearing the hammer put up her hands and moved in front of her dark-haired companion, who – like Yelena – had begun to raise her weapon, “I take it this Serov is no friend of yours?”

“To say the least,” Peggy replied, still holding back Yelena, whose glare was burning holes into Natasha like awls.

All the while Natasha pretended to clean her fingernails.

Kids these days. Honestly.

“I am Thor,” the warrior lay a hand across her heart, “This is Odinson, and the Lady Sif. We come from Asgard pursuing the culprit behind a crime most grave. And it seems that culprit is your Ivan Serov.”

“We share common purpose,” Odinson agreed, leaning on his massive axe, “What do you know of that?” He gestured to the partially melted house behind them.

It was then that Peggy realised one of his arms was completely mechanical. She glanced at Angie, who was staring at the house, pale as a ghost. Shaking her head, at last lowering her arms, Peggy looked to Yelena and Natasha, “I’ve never seen anything like that before.”

Both Russians gave identical half shrugs.

“I have.”

Everyone turned to stare.

Angie looked shaken and wan. Her bottom lip trembled, but her eyes were clear, resolute, “Back in Bolivia. When I killed him. That _stuff_ was there. I used it to hide the body.”

_Oh._

Natasha crossed her arms and tossed back her hair. She looked far too smug for her own good, “Told you you wouldn’t believe me.”

 


	3. Chapter 3

“You dumped his body into a portal to another dimension?!”

Angie bristled at the tone of Natasha’s voice, a mixture of accusatory and incredulous, “Well, how the hell was I supposed to know it was a portal? Usually portals don’t hang out in broom closets! Not that I've had much experience with interdimensional portals,” she added aside, "But if I did, I would imagine they wouldn't frequent broom closets!

“Maybe the glowing and the tungsten door could’ve been a hint!” Natasha retorted.

“I was a little preoccupied at the time!” Angie snapped back, “Or did you forget the fact that you’d kidnapped Peggy, and were planning on framing her for treason?”

Natasha waved that little detail away and scoffed, “Water under the bridge!”

They were all still standing outside the old stone house in Flanders. Yelena had moved to sit on the hood of the jeep, her slow-moving gaze belying the casual way her hand rested on the assault rifle. Odinson, Sif and Thor watched Angie and Natasha bicker, after they had explained their theory on the dark matter that had melted the house behind them.

“Our main priority,” Peggy interrupted before the argument could escalate any further, “is finding where Serov has gone, and what he plans to do next.”

“If he truly was dead as you claim –” Thor began.

“He _is_ dead,” Angie insisted.

Thor inclined her head, “–Then necromancy is the only explanation I can see. Which means he has a master. Someone pulling his strings.”

Odinson’s gaze darkened. “Hela,” he growled.

“We don’t know for certain if she is behind this,” Thor pointed out.

Odinson gave her a flat stare, “She is the Death Queen. Who else would reanimate the dead at a time like this?”

“Which means Loki is also involved,” Sif had finally sheathed the weapons on her back, though her hands clenched around air as though she still wielded them.

At that Odinson looked taken aback, “We can’t know that. He has committed no crime yet.”

“Do not let sentimentality cloud your good sense,” Sif sneered, “Just because he’s your bother does not preclude that he is prophesied to captain Hel’s Legions.”

“Prophecies are often muddied,” Odinson countered, squaring his jaw mulishly.

“Be that as it may,” Thor held her hand out towards Sif, “I am inclined to agree with the Lady of War on this matter. We should explore all options and take Loki in for questioning.”

Meanwhile Natasha sidled up to Peggy, “So what about that amnesty?”

Arching a cool brow, Peggy crossed her arms, “This isn’t anywhere near enough information for me to clear your name. If you want amnesty, you’ll have to earn it. Just like Yelena did.”

Natasha shot Yelena an ugly look, and Yelena grinned broadly, fingers drumming on the butt of her rifle.

“I advised you be killed on sight, by the way,” Yelena informed her cheerily.

“Advice which I chose to ignore,” Peggy fixed Natasha with a hard stare.

“Why did you even hire me?” Yelena grumbled, fingers quickening their pace on the rifle as she continued to watch Natasha with the same intensity that a cat watches a canary.

“For your winning personality,” Angie shot back dryly.

“Heimdall,” Odinson said to his brooch then, “Prepare the Bifrost to transport seven people.”

All four humans’ heads jerked around at that.

“Hold up,” Natasha’s hand twitched to the handgun strapped to her thigh, her stance defensive and coiled as a snake’s, “I didn’t agree to anything yet.”

Seeing Natasha’s movements, Lady Sif’s own hand flew to the hilt of her sword, grasping it firmly, “You are coming with us to Asgard. This is not negotiable.”

“You can’t be serious,” Natasha hissed, looking between her and Peggy, trying to gauge their expressions.

Yelena threw back her head and laughed, “You wanted to prove yourself. Now’s your chance, _ved’ma_.”

“Like Hell I’m going to space with these meatheads,” Natasha jabbed a finger at Sif and Thor and – in particular – Odinson.

In her defence, Peggy _did_ think that Odinson looked a bit ridiculous cavorting around without a shirt. Not that she couldn’t admire the view, but it was silly really. Not to mention the others’ armour. You couldn’t pay Peggy to wear something so preposterous. Hell would freeze over first.

“Help us with this mission to the fullest extent of your capabilities, and I’ll consider your plea for amnesty. Provided we all survive, of course.” Peggy might have enjoyed the way Natasha’s face fell just a little too much.

It certainly helped soothe her still stinging ego. She hadn’t forgotten the events of Cuba.

Natasha’s shoulders straightened as though steeling herself for a physical blow, “Fine.” She spat through grit teeth.

“Excellent,” Peggy turned to Odinson, “Now you may…” she trailed off and waved her hand at him vaguely. Whatever he had been about to do, anyway. Lord only knew what.

He nodded, “As I said, Heimdall, seven –”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa!” Angie held up her hands, “Make that eight!”

Peggy blinked.

Oh.

Right.

_That._

She cleared her throat at the confused stares from the Asgardians, and pointed to her stomach, “The eighth.”

“Actually, it’s nine,” Heimdall’s voice rumbled through the brooch.

Peggy frowned, bemused, “Beg pardon?”

“I detect nine lifeforms in your vicinity,” he clarified.

For a moment Peggy looked around them in confusion. Perhaps someone had snuck up on them without anyone noticing? Perhaps there was a dog hidden under the jeep?

But then she caught the beaming look on Angie’s face, “Twins!” Angie’s smile was soft but wide, “It runs in the family, you know.”

“Yes, _your_ family,” Peggy pointed out, still stunned by the news, “Not my family!”

“You saying I’m not family?” Angie teased, even as she reached over and laced their fingers together.

“You know that’s not what I meant,” Peggy gave her hand a warm squeeze. It really was quite difficult not to lean over and kiss her – the others be damned.

“Ugh,” Natasha rolled her eyes, face scrunched up like a bad smell had wafted by, “Are they always like this?”

“Pretty much,” Yelena grimaced, “You never get used to it, either.”

Just then a beam of light appeared in the sky, flashing downward and encasing the group. Yelena barely had enough time to hop down from the hood of the car before they were cast up into the air, hurtling through space in a blinding array of colour, all blending together into a single mind-numbing white.

Thor, Odinson and Sif all landed like cats on nimble feet, whereas Peggy found herself flat on her back and winded. Head spinning, she groaned and hauled herself to her feet. At least Yelena and Natasha had also experienced just as graceless a landing. Yelena winced and rubbed at her hip, reaching up to fix her eye-patch, which had been knocked awry to reveal the flat lid of a scarred and empty eye-socket beneath. On the other hand Angie only staggered a bit before catching herself, little spikes shooting out of her prosthetic foot like claws and stabilising her at the push of a button.

She waved her gloved hand and waggled her eyebrows with a grin, “Gauntlet: 1. Gravity: 0.”

“Until it can cushion my fall as well, I remain unconvinced,” Peggy groaned as she rolled her neck. She really was getting too old for this sort of thing.

This would be the last time she went out into the field. The very last.

No sooner had Peggy clambered back to her feet than Angie accosted the giant hulking man in gold armour standing over them, “Heimdall, right?” she cocked her head at the two-handed sword he pulled form a mechanical clamp in the ground, “So, is that a sort of key? Or does it complete a circuit to activate this thing?” She waved a hand around them.

Instead of answering, his unblinking gaze – unsettling if you asked Peggy – fixed upon Angie, “I have seen you before. Why is that?”

“I –” Angie’s face screwed up into a puzzled scowl, “When was it?”

“Years ago. We received a weak signal from Midgard, and when I looked down you were there. You were too,” He swung his heavy gaze to Peggy as well, and Peggy felt it like a weight across the chest.

Angie tapped her chin, then her face lit up, “Oh! The long-range transmitter from back in ’44!” She rounded on Peggy, exuberant, “I _told_ you it could reach further than the moon!”

“Well, that explains the signal you’ve all been tracking,” Peggy said to Heimdall, “Presumably Serov has had it in his possession since –”

She pursed her lips and her eyes flicked down to Angie’s leg.

“–Since Angie’s capture and torture?” Yelena finished, blunt.

The muscles in Angie’s jaw bunched, “Why do you gotta just go and say it like that?”

Yelena just slung her rifle over her shoulder, “It’s been eleven years. You need to accept it and move on.”

“How about I cut off one of _your_ limbs, and we’ll see how well you ‘accept it and move on’?” Angie snarled.

There were very few times Peggy saw Angie actually shake with anger, but this was one of them. Something terrible lived in the tremble of her fists and the flex of metallic plates in her leg. Yelena smiled at it, and something unspoken passed between them.

“Just like old times,” Yelena murmured, low and sickly sweet.

“Shut up,” Angie forced her fists to unclench, breathing heavily.

Peggy didn’t know what that was all about, and she felt she never truly would. She could pester Angie all she liked, but she suspected it had something to do with the subject of the serum. Angie still didn’t like talking about that.

In the ensuing silence, Odinson asked Heimdall, “How is my mother?”

“She remains stable,” Heimdall answered without hesitation, “She should awaken soon.”

Odinson heaved a deep sigh of relief, “That is good to hear.”

“Any sign from the thief?” Thor pressed, tucking Mjolnir into a loop at her belt.

Heimdall shook his massive helmed head, “Alas, he continues to elude me.”

“Whatever dark magic cloaks him must be powerful beyond measure,” Odinson worried the hide-wrapped grip of his axe with his thumb, a nervous gesture.

“And now that he has the–” Sif began, but clamped her mouth shut.

At that Peggy’s eyes narrowed, “What exactly did Serov steal from you?”

All the Asgardians exchanged unreadable glances, before Odinson said slowly, “An artefact that in the wrong hands would yield horrific results.”

“We call it the Infinity Gauntlet,” Sif explained, “It is encrusted with six stones of great power that can unravel reality itself. The wearer is near invincible.”

Peggy nudged Angie with her elbow, “I think you’re going to have to rename your glove, darling.”

Angie looked mournfully down at her arm and muttered, “Damn.”

“The Gauntlet had but two stones: Power and Time,” Heimdall added, “The others are, as far as we know, still safe.”

“That’s something, though,” Natasha tugged at the weapons bracketing her wrists, sending a blue pulse through the bundled rods, “At least we know now he isn’t _really_ invincible. Just sort of.”

“Yes, how comforting,” Yelena murmured.

“That is not our only concern,” Sif looked at Odinson, who nodded, before continuing, “But perhaps it is better to show you.”

Well, that just sounded ominous.

Angie just looked plain puzzled, but Natasha and Yelena wore identical wary expressions that mirrored Peggy’s own.

Thor, Odinson and Sif began walking away, and the others followed, leaving Heimdall behind. Looking down, Peggy immediately wished she hadn’t. Beneath her feet stretched a bridge like crystal, all glittering with that same light from their trip just earlier, and beneath that was a vast empty void. Suddenly the bridge felt slick and frail. She quickened her step and didn’t breathe easy until they reached land once more.

Heights were one thing, but the endless drop into space was quite another. Peggy could and would happily fling herself from an airplane with nothing but a silk parachute strapped to her back, but she would rather avoid crossing that bridge again any time soon, thank you very much.

Through the glittering domed city and the towering palace walls, they walked. Peggy had to physically peel Angie away from some new technological advancement at least six times. And every time Angie would drag her heels just a little bit more, until Peggy gave up and kept a hand on her arm for the duration of the walk.

“Ooh!” Angie’s eyes strayed as they passed by what appeared to be a floating stretcher, upon which a man reclined like it was a palanquin.

“Later,” Peggy pulled her along.

“But -!”

 _“Later!”_ Peggy repeated more firmly.

With a pout Angie nonetheless complied.

At last they seemed to reach their destination. What once must have been a grand hall was now a mass of rubble and detritus strewn all about the floor. Their feet slipped on loose stones, and there – peeking out amidst all the cream and gold streaked marble debris – leaned a sword. Almost like it had been forgotten. Tossed aside, so that it tilted against the ground, glittering with motes of dust like flecks of copper.

“That,” Peggy stood in front of it, hands on her hips, “has to be the gaudiest thing I have ever seen. It’s ghastly.”

It really was too. Every inch of the hilt was painstakingly wrapped with beaten gold, and in the pommel there winked a red stone the size of a child’s fist.

“How would you even swing the damn thing around? It’s –” she picked it up, expecting it to be heavy, but it sprang free from the rubble. She almost stumbled back. Gripping the handle experimentally, the metal strangely warm beneath her fingers, Peggy turned it over to look down the double-edged blade, “Well, it’s still ridiculous.”

Honestly she wouldn’t be caught dead trying to fight with something so silly. Give her a gun anyday over this ornamental useless piece of –

“Um…Peg?” Angie prodded her elbow.

“Hmm? Oh, apologies.” Setting the sword back down, she brushed off her hands, turning, “What were we here to look at -?”

She froze.

Thor, Odinson and Sif all gaped at her. Mouths hanging wide open like flytraps.

Sif pointed at the sword and her hand trembled, “That is the Odinsword. Also called Ragnarok. You just started the end of the world.”

Oh.

Slowly Peggy backed away from the sword, putting her hands behind her back.

 _Well, then._  

 


	4. Chapter 4

The silence stretched for an uncomfortable length of time. Long enough for Peggy to clear her throat and Angie to shuffle her feet awkwardly. Until finally –

“That’s a joke, right?” Natasha cracked a wishful, hesitant smile.

“I can’t remember the last time I said a joke,” Sif replied gravely.

“Last fortnight,” Odinson piped up, “Volstagg tripped over a chair after too much mead. You said something very witty.”

He trailed off under Sif’s withering glare.

“If the cycle has begun, then we must act quickly,” Thor clutched Mjolnir close, as though the hammer provided her some small measure of comfort, and Peggy did not miss the longing way Odinson’s eyes followed the movements, “Loki must be apprehended for questioning. We must find the Gauntlet before –”

She didn’t finish the sentence. Then again she didn’t need to.

“I demand to be there when you take in Loki,” Odinson insisted, “I will not see him mistreated for crimes he has not yet committed.”

Gritting her teeth, Sif did her best to ignore him and instead addressed Peggy, “You’ll need armour for the battle ahead of us. We don’t have time for a smith to forge something new, but I may have something that will fit.”

Oh, no.

A ridiculous suit of armour was where Peggy drew the line.

Arms crossed, jaw squared to a stubborn line, Peggy put her foot down, “There is no way you’re getting me into armour. What I’m wearing now will have to suffice. And I’m not carrying around that _thing_.” She pointed reproachfully at the sword.

Almost as if in response it gleamed, though the lighting had not changed.

“You all have fun playing dress-up,” Natasha moved to stand next to Odinson and Thor, “I think I’ll pass, and head out with these guys.”

Yelena’s hand strayed to her assault rifle, “I’m not letting you out of my sight.”

“Really? Because I imagine that would be difficult what with your – ah –” Natasha gestured to her own right eye.

Yelena scowled, her face darkening.

To be perfectly honest Peggy couldn’t think of a worse scenario than Yelena and Natasha alone together on an alien world. Even if they were to be watched over by two demi gods. Peggy sincerely doubted that would stop them from flying at each other with teeth bared.

“Let her go, Yelena,” Peggy said, “Maybe she can even be useful to them.”

At that Natasha just arched an amused eyebrow, but said nothing.

“If we run into any trouble,” Thor was already striding towards the exit, red cape billowing out behind her, “You will probably hear it.”

As if on cue Mjolnir gave a threatening crackle, and if Peggy didn’t know any better she would’ve said the hammer seemed _eager._

But that was impossible. Weapons didn’t have thoughts and emotions.

As Peggy picked her way through the rubble strewn all about, Sif jerked her head, pointing with her chin, “You will need to take that with you.”

Peggy frowned over her shoulder at where the Odinsword still sat, propped against a cracked marble boulder, “Not a chance. It can rot there for all I care.”

She turned and continued walking away. If she had to prance about in a silly suit of armour for these people, at least she would retain some dignity by not having that sword strapped to her back. The monstrous thing was taller than she was, for God’s sake!

A shudder ran through the ground. Up high the stone vaulting trembled, and waves of glittering dust and bits of rock rained down. With every step Peggy took way from the sword, the rumble grew in pitch. When Peggy whirled around to glare, the sword gave an almost desultory glint.

“Maybe you should…” Angie didn’t finish the sentence though, because Peggy stormed over to the sword and snatched it up.

“You are _childish_ ,” Peggy hissed at it.

The hilt flashed hot beneath her fingers. Not hot enough to burn, but enough to act as a warning, enough to give voice to its displeasure at being insulted, and then ignored, and then insulted again.

Seeing its leather-bound and gold-encrusted scabbard lying not far off, Peggy shoved the sword into its sheath, then swung it across her back so that the broad strap stretched from shoulder to hip. She did her best to stomp her way back towards the others, but it was difficult to achieve an air of cold fury with her feet slipping over loose stones. Perhaps the Lady Sif had a point about that at least. The armour idea was still ridiculous, but at this point Peggy wouldn’t say no to a different pair of more durable shoes.

The damn sword didn’t help either. Being so large its tip grazed her footsteps even with the hilt jutting above one shoulder. More than once it got stuck on a patch of uneven ground, making her trip. Peggy was sure the sword did it on purpose. If asked she wouldn’t be able to say exactly how she knew, only that she could feel a pervading sense of smug satisfaction, like a cat resting on her shoulder and kneading with needle-sharp claws just on the edge of pain.

“This way,” Sif began walking, and Peggy, Angie and Yelena followed.

The journey was quiet, with Yelena sulking about Natasha, and Peggy adamantly ignoring her. Not to mention Angie eyeing the sword across Peggy’s back with a mixture of awe and intense contemplation. As though it were a puzzle to be solved.

Then the Lady Sif cleared her throat as they rounded a corner, and asked, “What manner of goods do you deliver?”

“I…beg your pardon?” Peggy gave her head a little shake, unsure if Sif was even speaking to her. When she glanced over at Angie and Yelena however, they both shrugged in confusion as well.

“Your name: Carter,” Sif clarified, “You transport wares, do you not?”

A little huff of laughter escaped Peggy, “Oh – lord, no. My name has very little to do with my job. I run a spy and anti-terrorism agency. One of the largest on my world.”

Sif’s black brows climbed, and she looked at Peggy with a newfound respect and wariness in equal measure, “A spymaster? And your companions here are spies?”

Angie snorted.

“Not exactly,” Peggy said.

“I’m one of your spies,” Yelena held up her hand.

“True. But you’re,” and here Peggy paused before finishing delicately, “a recent acquisition.”

“She means Yelena’s an enemy assassin who switched sides,” Angie corrected, blunt, and Sif’s eyes darted to Yelena in a hard scrutinising stare.

Yelena didn’t seem perturbed by that in the slightest. If anything she positively preened.

“And you?” Sif looked over her shoulder at Angie, noting the mechanical leg beneath the cloth of her pants, “Are you a turncoat assassin as well?”

Angie laughed a bit nervously, “What? God no! I’m the brains behind the operation. And also the humble one. Got to keep these kids in line, you know? Else their heads would swell up and explode.”

She even mimed the explosion with her hands. Sound effects and all. _Kabloosh!_

Yelena mimicked her, except silently and with her hands over Peggy’s head. Peggy narrowed her eyes and gave her a supremely unimpressed look. Sif just seemed confused by their antics, but she made no comment.

After rounding a few more corners and making their way down side corridors, they arrived at Sif’s private quarters. ‘Spartan’ was the word that readily came to mind when Peggy looked around. The overall earth tones were broken by the occasional splash of bold red across the space, and the rarer hint of blues and silvers.

Sif strode to a wall, and pressed a panel. Part of the wall sank inwards, then slid open to reveal a walk-in compartment as large as the sleeping quarters themselves. It was Sif’s own private little armoury. She could probably outfit a small company of soldiers with the contents of this one room.

Yelena began admiring some of the weapons lining the walls, fingers reaching out to trace the handle of a long wicked looking dagger. On the other hand Angie didn’t even make it inside. Instead she studied the panel on the wall outside, tapping away at the metal glove on her arm, which chirped after a variety of inputs.

Sif strode to the very back and pulled from a rack a spare suit of armour. Cautiously Peggy joined her. Sif held the armour up, shoving it into Peggy’s chest, “It will have to do. Put it on.”

With a cough and a glare, Peggy set down the armour then began to strip, propping the Odinsword against a nearby rack holding shields. Sif moved on, pulling a simple cotton shirt and sturdy leather jerkin from a shelf then tossing them at Peggy.

“These first. And these,” she dropped a pair of stout linen trousers at Peggy’s feet along with a pair of thigh-high leather boots welded with plates of metal like greaves.

As the tactical uniform slipped to the floor, Yelena’s admiring eye shifted from the weapons. She leaned against a shelf and picked at her fingernails with an elegantly curved throwing knife while she watched Peggy get dressed.

“You’re missing the show, Angie,” she called out, leering.

“Hmm?” Angie’s head popped into view, took in the scene, then disappeared again, “Ain’t nothing I haven’t seen before.”

Oh, now, _really._ Was that necessary?

With a huff, Peggy turned her back and did her best to ignore them.

Sif shot them all an incredulous stare, then shook her head and moved to stand in front of Yelena. Plucking the knife from her hands, Sif placed the weapon back on its mount on the wall, “What exactly did you do to win your Spymaster’s favour?”

Yelena craned her neck to try to look around her, but Sif crossed her arms and blocked her view.

With a smirk more like a sneer, Yelena answered, “I was a witch. And I helped stop a bloody Sabbath.”

Sif’s spine stiffened, and she looked to Peggy, “Is this true?”

Peggy pulled the leather jerkin over her head and tied it at her waist, “She jests. Though she _did_ help me. That much is true at least.”

“It is the choice of words that concerns me,” Sif admitted, turning back to Yelena, “Ragnarok is heralded by a Sabbath of Witches, among other things. But it seems that omen has already come and gone.”

“What other prophecies do we have to worry about?” Peggy asked, slipping the breastplate around her torso and fumbling with the buckles at her flank.

Sif began ticking them off on her fingers, “Sleipnir must ride on the Wild Hunt. Witches must be thwarted in their bloody Sabbath. Odin must battle the great Fenris Wolf. The sea snake, Jormungand, will slither onto land and battle with Thor, who will kill it but slowly succumb to its poison. A cockerel will raise the dead. The stars will vanish from the sky. Earthquakes and flame will wrack the –”

“Alright, yes,” Peggy fastened the bracers over her forearms, “I think we get the picture.” Slinging the Odinsword back over her shoulder, she turned around, hands on her hips, “Well?”

Yelena and Sif both cocked their heads. “Not bad,” Yelena said.

“I am a little taller,” Sif mused, “But it will protect you from most forms of attack. May it serve you well, Spymaster.”

“Bloody _ridiculous_ ,” Peggy muttered under her breath, adjusting how the Odinsword rested across her back.

The plate armour was nearly identical to the suit Sif currently wore. Stately. Reserved yet with fine detailing and fluting that both strengthened and ornamented alike. Yet there was a dangerous grandeur to the attire. Something baleful in the sleek lines of the cuirass and the wide-sloped pauldrons. The only discernible difference was the colour – Peggy’s accented with rich royal blues, rather than dark savage reds.

When Peggy stamped from the little armoury, booted feet clanking and armour pulling in uncomfortable places, Angie did a double take. She had the panel partially pulled away from the wall and was working on disassembling the systems behind it, “Whoa! Peg, you look –”

“Ludicrous?” Peggy supplied for her.

“I was going to say ‘regal’ but sure!” she leaned in to press a quick kiss to the corner of Peggy’s mouth.

Sif appeared behind them and said gravely, “As only the Heir of Odin should.”

Peggy didn't like the sound of that. Not one bit. 

Angie held up her hand and mimed pushing Sif away, “Back up. Heir of who now what where?”

But before Sif could response, a boom like thunder resounded from the floors below, followed by another smaller clap. Even this far away, Peggy winced, and saw Angie and Yelena do the same. On the other hand Sif’s head jerked in the direction of the roar, alert.

“They’ve cornered him,” she growled. Then she drew sword and shield, and sprinted off in the direction of the resounding peal still echoing through the halls.

Peggy and Angie pursued, Yelena snatching up the dagger she had been admiring earlier before following as well. By the time they arrived in the dungeons, Loki was already being dragged into a cell by Thor, her hand fisted in his hair. Natasha sported a nasty bruise on her jaw, and Odinson nursed what looked to be a fractured rib. Not that it slowed either of them down. Thor tossed Loki into a cell, and a wall of light seared into place, before quivering into transparency. There, locked away, Loki set his feet to pacing, restless.

“Are you alright?” Odinson put one massive hand on Natasha’s shoulder.

She shrugged it away, “Nothing I can’t handle. He’s slippery, that one.”

Loki did not seem to care if Natasha was a possible threat. He moved until she was caught in his stare, and he glittered darkly like a snake. Not just his green-threaded clothes, but his very skin as well. He seemed sleeker, sharper than the others, as though he had been sheathed in scales, “You have the Devil in you, child.” He taunted, “And you’ll never get it out.”

Natasha’s expression went stony and pale as death, “We all have our demons.”

He hummed, “Some just more than others.”

When Sif and the others made their way towards the rest of the group, Loki’s pacing stilled. “Ah,” his unblinking gaze fixed upon Peggy, “Odin’s successor. Or so I presume.”

“I am not the reincarnation of your god,” Peggy snapped. She was getting real tired of this ‘Odin’s Heir’ business already. Behind her Angie pressed a button on her glove and the blunted taser flicked out with a smooth click. At the same time Yelena flipped the dagger around in her fingers. Both of them flanked Peggy like a pair of guards.

Loki did not spare them a glance. He just spread his arms wide, and his grin seemed to expand even wider, “We’re all gods here.”

“Enough,” Thor gripped Mjolnir tight, and lightning arced around her arm, “Tell us about Hela.”

At that he seemed genuinely alarmed. As genuine as he was capable of being, in any case. Yet even when he answer questions given to him by others, his eyes remained motionless, riveted on Peggy and the Odinsword peeking over one shoulder, “Hela? I haven’t spoken with her since that business with Balder.”

“You mean when you tried to kill him and invade Asgard?” Thor snarled.

Loki’s rolled his shoulders in a nonchalant shrug, “Are you all still stinging after that? I thought that was old news.”

“You’re lying,” crossing his arms, the mechanical one glinting in the harsh white light of the prison, Odinson looked at his brother with disappointment, “I know for a fact that you met with Hela only three fortnights ago.”

“Oh, that?” Loki waved it away as though it were a minor irritation, like a gadfly, “That visit was purely for pleasure. We didn’t discuss business.”

Sif looked like she wanted to stab him, but instead she settled for jabbing her sword into the ground, where it hit with enough force to flake off a chip of stone, “And what business might that be?”

“There was no business. That’s the point,” Loki said with exaggerated slowness as though speaking to a simpleton, “So far I have absolutely nothing to do with this Ragnarok. I have yet to be a part of its cycle.”

“I don’t believe you,” Sif snarled.

Sadly Peggy did. He had nothing to do with Ragnarok. Yet.

“Then what must be done?” Peggy asked.

“I thought the answer was obvious,” Loki mocked, and took a step closer to the edge of his cell until he was nearly pressed up against the transparent barrier, “Odin’s successor must be found and take up the name of the All-Father. The battle must be fought. The cycle must be completed.”

“Oh, is that all?” Peggy knew she was being sarcastic, but at this point she didn’t particularly care, “Yes, I suppose I’ll just go slay a wolf then! Do you have many of those around here?”

“Two, actually,” Odinson said, “Geri and Freki. But they will be your companions, not your enemies.”

Peggy grit her teeth, “For the last time: I am _not_ Odin’s heir.”

At that point Angie retracted the taser. She stepped towards Loki’s cell, and looked up into his face, “We’ll do it. On one condition.”

Everyone turned to stare. Up until that point Angie had remained at the back of the group, silent.

“Angie,” Peggy hissed, “What are you doing?”

But Angie ignored her, shoulders squared, resolute. Peggy knew that look. It was the same look she got when she caught Howard drinking in the lab, when she sabotaged long-range otherworldly transmitters and demanded to accompany Peggy on dangerous missions into Nazi-occupied Italy, when spoke about Serov in the dead quiet of night. It was a hard, focused look. As though she gathered every ounce of herself into a single point in space. Peggy never could look away when she was like this.

“If Peggy wins,” Angie said, and her words held a finality, “then she gets an apple.”

An… _apple?_

At first Peggy didn’t know what on earth she was talking about. And then it hit her like a bolt from the blue.

Not just any apple. A _golden_ apple.

Loki smiled that barbed smile. At last his eyes moved from Peggy and came to rest on Angie, and Peggy felt a physical chill enter the room, “You have yourself a deal.”


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> we're back in business

“Excuse us a moment,” Peggy said, taking Angie by the arm and dragging her aside to whisper low, rushed and furious in her ear, “What the hell are you doing?”

“You’re going to have to fight in this thing anyway,” Angie replied, keeping her voice down as well, despite the fact that the others could clearly hear them. “Way I see it, you might as well get something out of it.”

“Like _immortality?_ ” Peggy hissed incredulously. “Angie, I don’t want to live forever!”

“You don’t have to live forever! You just have to live long enough!”

Angie’s eyes blazed, suddenly fierce, her jaw clenched. Taken aback, Peggy dropped her hold on Angie’s arm and stared. “I thought we discussed this,” she began, more gently this time, but Angie shook her head. It was less denying Peggy’s statement and more in denial of the situation as a whole.

“It doesn’t have to be that way anymore!” she insisted hotly, adamant, holding her ground with a desperation Peggy only rarely saw. “You don’t have to grow old. We can both live. Together.”

“At what cost? Making deals with gods?” Peggy gestured behind her, where the gods in question shared an inscrutable look. All except Loki, whose eyes remained fixed now upon Angie, smirking to himself like he knew a secret nobody else did. “Last I looked, that never ended well. Especially bargains made with trickster gods!”

If anything Loki’s aura of smug amusement seemed to increase and radiate off him in waves. There were many times in her life when Peggy wanted to punch someone, but the urge washed over her now until her hands itched. She didn’t realise she’d reached up to grip Odinsword’s hilt until Angie’s expression turned startled. The others all tensed, watching her warily from the opposite end of the room. Even Yelena and Natasha eyed her sidelong.

Shaking her head and blinking against a haze, Peggy released the Odinsword and lowered her arm. The leather and plate of her armour creaked.

“Are you ok?” Angie asked, moving to grasp Peggy’s forearm, but stopping when she touched the cool metal of armour.

“It’s nothing,” Peggy waved her concern away, pinching the bridge of her nose and squeezing her eyes shut. The keen edge of a headache stung at her skull like a paper cut, a sharp undercurrent. “I don’t want the apple. And I don’t want the damn sword. I want to get to the bottom of this, and then I want to go home.”

“Just,” Angie pressed, “take the apple. At least then you’ll have the option later.”

With a sigh, Peggy conceded, “Fine. Fine!” The headache was still making little incisions behind her eyes. Turning, she stomped back to the rest of the group and addressed Odinson, Sif and Thor, “An, apple, then. That’s my price.”

Sif pursed her lips and Thor crossed her arms, but Odinson rumbled without hesitation, “You have my word.”

Apparently saving the universe from utter annihilation was worth one mortal’s chance at life everlasting.

“That’s all well and good,” Yelena drawled from the side lines, flipping the throwing knife she’d stolen from Sif between her fingers in a neat flourish, “but how do you intend to kill Serov if you can’t even find him?”

From inside his cell Loki heaved a dramatic sigh, “If only we knew where Odin went to gain knowledge!” He frowned and tapped at his chin, “Oh, wait…”

Sif and Thor glared at him, and both looked like they wanted to lower the cell force field in order to pummel him to a pulp. Peggy couldn’t disagree. She’d gladly help them. Something about him sent an unpleasant crawling shiver down her spine.

On the other hand Angie glanced around. “Where does Odin go for knowledge?” she muttered to Natasha, who just shrugged.

“Mímir’s Well,” Odinson answered, his voice as grave as his expression. His gaze swung to Peggy and he seemed almost _pitying_ in the way he looked at her. “And Mímir too has his price.”

Oh, bloody hell. 

Peggy did not like the sound of that one bit.

 

* * *

 

 

“Why can’t we just use your magical rainbow road to get there?” Natasha grumbled.

“The Bifrost is a portal to Asgard from the other realms,” Sif explained as she and Thor and Odinson strode at the head of the group. “It cannot provide transportation within Asgard itself.”

“Yes, but -” Natasha made a face, “-can’t we use a _vehicle?_ ”

The group had left Loki imprisoned – at which he had sighed and called after them that they were being incredibly rude – and started to make their way to the Royal Stables. Except the Asgardians had neglected to share that little piece of information until they were almost there. That was when Natasha and Peggy both balked.

“I happen to agree for once,” Peggy groused.

Why horses? Wasn’t it bad enough that she had to parade around in this absurd get up? Would they pry every last scrap of dignity from her cold fingers?

“That’s a first,” Yelena muttered, not bothering to keep it under her breath.

Aiming a glare, Peggy snapped, “I don’t like horses.”

“They’re not right,” Natasha agreed wholeheartedly, scowling as they entered the stables.

These were nothing like any stables Peggy had encountered back on earth. She doubted the horses would be similar either. Straw did not litter the ground, nor did the smell of horse manure and sweat fill the air. Instead the ground was neatly combed, and shallow pewter dishes adorned the carved wooden archways, burning incense. It was above all else like a temple. Smoky threads of myrrh coiled among the vaulted ceiling, and armour for the horses hung from the walls. High up in the rafters there rustled the scrape of feathers. Looking up, Peggy saw two ravens peering down at the group, and shuffling amidst smoke.

At the far end of the hall, a horse stepped from its open stall. Immediately Peggy and Natasha took a step back, identical expressions of horror painted plainly on their faces.

The beast was massive. Sleek and black it dwarfed any horses Peggy had seen in the past, and suddenly she understood the need for such high ceilings. Where its eight hooves struck the earth, sparks leapt to life, scorching the ground in its wake with prints the size of anvils. Tossing its glossy mane, its eyes burned a rich gold, long tail sweeping its fire-blackened footsteps.

“You know, I’ve been thinking,” Natasha said to Peggy, neither of them wrenching their wide-eyed gazes from the creature. “Is this really worth it? Amnesty? The end of the world? I’m starting to have my doubts.”

“You and me both,” Peggy replied.

On the other hand Angie rolled her eyes, “You two are such babies. Honestly!” Stepping forward, she approached it with an outstretched hand. Its nostrils flared before it lowered its great head so that its velvety nose bumped her palm. “See?” Angie flashed a satisfied smile over her shoulder, “He ain’t so bad!”

Taking Angie’s cue, Yelena also strode forward. As she drew near however, the horse reared its head, thick neck rippling, dappled darkly in the torchlight. It pulled back its lip, bearing teeth engraved with runes that seared crimson and amber.

Lady Sif watched in amusement as Yelena scrambled away. “Sleipnir is very particular about his riders. Critical, even.” She crossed her arms and gave Angie an approving glance, “You have a pure heart, Little Angel.”

Patting Sleipnir’s deep-muscled chest and neck, Angie grinned, “Aww, that’s what my Nana used to call me.”

At that Sif blinked, but did not reply.

“Odin’s Heir must ride Sleipnir in the Wild Hunt,” Odinson said, looking pointedly at Peggy.

Peggy shot a pleading, incredulous glance at each of them in turn. Thor and Sif waited for her to approach Sleipnir with guarded expressions, while Yelena was still wiping her tactical clothes free of dust from when she’d fallen earlier in her haste to get away. Meanwhile Natasha was gazing at her as though seeing someone perform the world’s most un-enviable task. With a groan Peggy gave in and crept over to where Angie gestured for Peggy to join her.

Sleipnir’s long combed tail swished, and Peggy schooled her face to keep from flinching. Sighing impatiently, Angie reached out and dragged Peggy forward, “He’s not going to bite you, Peg. Hop on already.”

“Please don’t make me ride this thing all by myself,” Peggy breathed weakly. Sleipnir angled his head to aim a penetrating molten glare at her, and she gulped.

“Don’t worry. I’ll ride with you,” Angie assured her, moving to pick up Sleipnir’s bridle from the wall. “We just won’t use a saddle. Now,” she held up the bridle and said to Thor, “How do you put this thing on?”

Thor belted Mjolnir at her hip and strode forward to help Angie, while Peggy continued to stare.

It wasn’t that she had a deadly fear of horses. Nothing of the sort. Back on earth she could ride them just fine, when she absolutely had to. She just didn't _like_ them. This beast however, filled her with a sense of foreboding, as though it were weighing her heart on a set of silvery scales and considering whether or not it deserved to be cast to the wolf pit.

Apparently Sleipnir decided she was tolerable, for when she touched his shoulder nothing happened but for his skin giving a little shudder like her touch was a fly bite. That was probably all she was to him: an annoying little fly. A mortal barely worth his time. It certainly seemed to be the case, because when she moved to drag a set of wooden steps free from the corner, his tail swatted her across the chest.

Alright, now she was just annoyed. That persistent headache certainly didn’t help.

Dropping the step ladder, Peggy clambered atop Sleipnir, throwing one leg over his broad back and awkwardly settling the Odinsword at the least uncomfortable angle. Without stirrups her feet hung down Sleipnir’s sides, and she shifted, flexing her ankles.

“Catch!” Angie called, throwing the reins over the horse’s head while Thor buckled the bridle in place. At the noise his fuzzy ears flicked.

Peggy groped for the reins and held them slackly while Sleipnir champed, unruly, at the bit, “Somehow I don’t think riding horses is the most ideal activity for a pregnant woman.”

“You’re early yet,” Angie insisted, climbing the steps and swinging herself up behind Peggy. “Besides, you really think horse riding is worse than sword fighting?”

“Good point.”

From across the stables they heard a vehement, “ _No._ No way in hell.”

Angie peered around Peggy’s broad, pauldrons-clad shoulders in curiosity. On the other side of the stables, Natasha had her arms crossed and was glaring at Sif and Odinson. The latter had wrangled up a pair of honest to god goats to pull a chariot. From their heads sprouted each a pair of huge curling horns, and they stamped their cloven feet. One of them gnashed its yellowish teeth in Natasha’s direction.

“It’s either the goats, or you can cling to Thor’s cape while she flies with Mjolnir,” Odinson said simply, attaching the chariot to the yokes. If he felt any pain from the broken rib he’d acquired in his fight with Loki earlier, he did not show it. “The decision is yours.”

He and Sif stood at the front of the chariot, leaving just enough space for the last two to climb up behind them. With a shrug Yelena hopped onto the back and took hold of one of the straps on Sif’s armour to anchor herself in place. Odinson gestured for Natasha to join them and grab hold of his waist.

For a moment Natasha stared at them as if they were all mad. Then she swore profusely in Russian and stomped over to the chariot. “Goats!” she spat between clenched teeth. “God damn _goats!_ ”

Suddenly Peggy didn’t mind the eight-legged freak horse so much. Until they started flying that was.

To be perfectly honest Peggy didn’t remember most of the ride, and she would prefer to keep it that way. It was smoother than she’d initially expected, that was for sure. Mostly she recalled flashes of lightning as Thor whizzed by them through the sky, and the flap of Odinson’s red cape, streaming in the wind and whipping a surly Natasha in the face. That and Angie’s warm arms fettered around her waist, as Peggy held onto Sleipnir’s reins for dear life and prayed he didn’t change course, because God knew she couldn’t steer him if she tried.

By the time they landed Peggy’s stomach was sloshing in its own acidity, and she hoped to never again ride a flying horse. Planes were fine, so long as she wasn’t jammed in the back, but eight-legged horses racing through the air? No, thank you.

Sliding from Sleipnir’s back with a groan, Peggy doubled over and tried to hold her last meal at bay. She didn’t think they would have the opportunity to eat again anytime soon, and this was already one of the longest days in recent memory, so Peggy would rather keep her last meal solidly in place. The day wasn’t over yet.

Dimly Peggy heard the rasp of raven’s wings as two of the birds landed on Sleipnir’s neck. One of them began preening his mane. They must have followed the group from the stables back near the city.

They’d landed in a clearing at the heart of a dense forest. Around them the trees bristled, engreening and enblackening beneath the veil of dusk.

Angie was still seated on Sleipnir’s back. The other raven hopped closer to her, dropping its neck for scritches, which she gave absentmindedly while she watched Peggy try to not hurl up the contents of her stomach. “You ok there, honey?” Angie asked with a grimace.

“I’ll be fine,” Peggy straightened, taking gulping breaths of air.

Beside them Thor landed in a blaze of crackling thunder, denting the ground, and Odinson’s chariot crashed to the ground, circling back a fair distance until he reined the goats to a halt. From the back of the chariot Natasha and Yelena leapt down, already in the thick of an argument and hissing at each other like angry cats.

In Peggy’s current state she muddled through only a handful of words here and there among the slew of rapid-tongued Russian. Something about someone named ‘Pyotr’ who was apparently dead. Also some very vulgar words tossed around that didn’t quite translated into English. Soon they were snarling at one another, hands edging towards their weapons.

Thor was still brushing herself off, and Sif was chatting with Odinson upon the chariot in the background.

A high pitched whine hummed near Peggy’s ear like a mosquito. It faded in and out, growing in intensity, slicing with trenchant cuts until her eye twitched. They stood upon the cusp of the world’s destruction, and Yelena and Natasha _bickered_ like children.

Before she realised what she was doing, Peggy reached up over her shoulder. It was when her hand fastened around the hilt there that she finally understood where that damn noise was coming from.

The Odinsword sang at her touch. It was too large, too long; she shouldn’t have been able to draw it over her shoulder with one hand, but it flicked from its sheath with ease nonetheless. The song resonated until Peggy could feel it vibrate in her teeth, heavy and lustful.

Lustful for what, Peggy did not want to say. Oh, she knew. She just didn’t want to say. She didn’t think she _could_ say. Speech and thought seemed to be beyond her.

The tip of the sword shivered a brilliant blue, sweeping up the cross-guard, and the ground trembled.

The bickering stopped. In fact all noise stopped. Even the distant sounds of birds and insects rustling through the wild. Everyone turned to stare.

Odinson propped his axe against the chariot and raised his hands, palms up. “You must sheathe the Odinsword,” his voice was low and soothing. “Even drawing it presents a danger to all of us.”

Sif was less calm, her eyes hard and dark as serpentstone. “You are tearing at the very fabric of reality,” she said, crouched into a defensive position, ready to strike if necessary. “Put the sword down.”

Peggy’s arm shook, and the earth beneath their feet groaned. She stared through a red haze down Odinsword’s edge, where it was pointed directly at Natasha and Yelena.

“Peggy?”

Head whipping around, Peggy’s hold on the Odinsword kept it aimed at the two assassins. Angie had slipped from Sleipnir’s back and stood nearby, drawing closer with every step.

“You can do this,” Angie nodded, keeping careful eye contact with her. “Put the sword away.”

Slowly Peggy lowered her arm, and the Odinsword lost its blue sheen, fading to a steely grey once more. The high-pitched whine droned on, but quieter. Her lungs screamed for air, and it was only then that Peggy realised she hadn’t been breathing. That first explosive inhalation left her reeling. She staggered, chest heaving. Her arm shook so badly she couldn’t sheathe the Odinsword until the fumbling third attempt. As soon as the sword was safely away, Angie closed the distance between them and smoothed Peggy’s hair back from where it slicked to her brow.

“Scared me there for a moment,” Angie traced her thumbs of Peggy’s temple with a relieved smile.

“I’m sorry,” Peggy panted. “I don’t know what came over me.”

“Weapons like these have wills of their own,” Thor hefted the hammer, which gave an answering crackle. “You must tread carefully.”

Well, at least it had gotten Yelena and Natasha to back away from one another. Surely a moment of peace and quiet was worth risking the structural integrity of reality.

Odinson allowed her only a moment to gather herself before he pointed toward the treeline, “Mímir is not far that way. We will wait here for your return.”

“You never said anything about having to do this alone,” Peggy wiped a bead of sweat from her brow, gently pulling Angie’s hands away as well. Angie let her, though she still studied her face with concern.

“You must complete this task alone, Odin’s Heir,” Sif said bluntly, as though that solved the problem.

“Yes, thank you. So I’ve gathered,” Peggy replied dryly. She turned to leave, but paused at the treeline. There she jabbed a finger at Yelena and Natasha, fixing them each with a glare. “No fighting!”

Neither had the decency to look even remotely chagrined.

With an irritated huff, Peggy trudged off, disappearing into the trees. Through the crowded thicket she tramped, not bothering to quiet her footfalls. She felt too heavy, too cumbersome, too noisy with all this armour.

The headache dug its needle-like claws into the soft meat in her skull. The Odinsword had no subtlety when it came to exerting its will. Shaking her head and squaring her jaw, Peggy did her best to ignore it.

Her stomach turned. She really shouldn’t have ridden that freak horse.

After a few minutes of walking the trees began to thin. Through the low-slung branches she squinted, trying to make out the scene beyond. When she stepped from the forest, she found herself in a small glade where the air was cool and fresh. It smelled like fresh snowfall, ice a sharp bite, an aftertaste on the back of the tongue.

From an old fallen log the shape of a man seemed to grow. His long beard was a tangle of vines, as pale as his moth-eaten robes. His skin was a network of fine wrinkles like spider webs, but his eyes were an inky boundless black, smooth as the night sky.

Clearing her throat Peggy approached, hesitant. She skirted around the edge of the small clear pool in the centre of the glade, careful not to touch it. “Excuse me,” she began, wincing at how intrusive her voice sounded to her own ears. This was a place where silence reigned. Words were unwelcome. She pressed on regardless. “I have come to drink from Mímir’s Well.”

In answer he turned over his hand, and his very bones creaked like the boughs of an old oak tree bending in the wind. He did not speak. Only gestured to the pool at his feet in what could have been interpreted as an invitation.

Peggy’s good sense overwhelmed her socially ingrained urge to automatically thank him, instead adhering to the glades spell of silence. Hands on hips, she peered around for a cup or something of that sort, before giving up. She knelt and scooped up a palmful of water. It gathered in the cracks between her fingers, but did not fall or drip.

Steeling herself with a deep breath, she raised her hands to her lips and drank.

Images flashed, ringing like a hammer at the forge, bright and hot and quick.

A cliff by the sea, swept rough by the salty air. A man in a circle of blood, clawing open his chest. A heart of black fire beating between his ribs, his entrails a nest of seething snakes. A gauntlet of gold, encrusted with gems that gleamed, and a dark master who wielded it, heralding destruction.

Between this and flying horses and a magical mind-possessing sword, there was only so much Peggy’s stomach could take. Clutching her abdomen, she tried to hold back until she could turn away, but instead was sick right into the sacred well.

Clapping a hand over her mouth, she looked aghast between Mímir and the well. He did not say or do anything. He only continued to stare into the void.

As delicately as she could manage – which was to say not very delicate at all – Peggy wiped her mouth and lumbered to her feet, armour clanking. As she did so, forcing the nip of mortification from her heels, Mímir’s hand turned again. He reached out to Peggy, fingers crooked into claws, demanding.

“The Price,” he rasped, his voice a wind, black and wet and of night. He turned his gaze upon her, and she knew exactly what he required.

Peggy leaned down and pulled free a knife from where it was slipped into her greaves. Trembling in her hand, she raised it and grit her teeth.

Saving the universe had better be worth it.

 


	6. Chapter 6

They all looked around when Peggy lumbered through the trees. The first thing they saw was the glint of the Odinsword over her shoulder, then the cloth wrapped around her head, dark with blood that streamed in dried rivulets down her right cheek.

Angie’s hand flew to her mouth in horror, but none of the Asgardians seemed remotely surprised. Darting forward Angie halted nearby when Peggy raised her hand, similarly caked in fresh blood – still gleaming scarlet in the coming night.

“I’m fine,” Peggy insisted, though she walked a little more crooked than usual. She blamed that on the loss of sight rather than the loss of blood. Back at the well, when Mímir had accepted his gristly offering in his clawed hands, the wound of her now empty eye-socket had bled quick and brief before closing rapidly, leaving scarred tissue in its wake as though it had happened years ago rather than minutes ago.

“Like hell you’re fine!” Angie reached out to touch the gore-matted cloth, wincing sympathetically. “This was his price? And you _knew?_ ”

That last bit she aimed at Odinson, Sif and Thor. At least Odinson and Thor gave near identical grimaces, apologetic in some respect. On the other hand Sif crossed her arms and met Angie’s furious challenging glare. “It surprises you that she should follow in Odin’s footsteps, as is her destiny?”

“She is not Odin’s Heir!” Angie snapped heatedly. “And even if she were, it wouldn’t mean a damn thing! Like that justifies losing an eye! What bullsh -!”

Peggy placed a soothing hand on Angie’s shoulder, the muscles there bunched and tense. “It had to be done. There’s no use crying over spilled milk.”

Biting back her words, Angie gave a livid huff and stamped her mechanical foot. As though to echo it, Sleipnir stamped two hooves, casting a shower of sparks across the ground that caught in a few nearby bushes and smouldered there. The motion startled the two ravens into flight, and they wheeled overhead.

Thor’s eyes were veiled beneath the shadows of her winged helm as they followed the ravens’ path. “What did you see at Mímir’s Well?” she asked.

“I –” Peggy flinched as a new series of images accosted her. Quick and hot they flashed, leaving behind faint impressions, like negative afterimages, the searing track of lightning a mere blinding memory. She rubbed at the empty socket beneath the cloth. It itched something dreadful. “I’m not sure, to be honest. Nothing concrete.”

“So not only did you lose an eye, but this was all a huge waste of time?” Natasha threw her hands up into the air and muttered, “ _Great._ ”

Over Angie’s shoulder Peggy saw Yelena making a face like she had just bitten into a lemon. After a moment she realised Yelena was trying to force back a smirk and failing. Her near prophetic words about ‘matching’ over a year ago made Peggy’s remaining eye narrow. “Not a single word,” she growled.

Yelena had to actually turn around in order to hide her smile, but not before Peggy saw a corner of it; it had a hysteric edge.

From Odinson’s shoulder, the brooch gave an indistinct murmur before a voice spoke through it. Except this time it wasn’t Heimdall. “My son, are you there?”

Immediately Odinson’s whole face brightened. “Mother, is that you? Are you well?”

“Still alive,” she answered, though she sounded tired, as though she were talking from a sickbed.

“Do you remember anything about your attacker?” he asked, “Anything at all? We need all the information at your disposal.”

“I saw the puppet who assaulted the Royal Vaults,” her voice replied clearly, “and when I looked beyond him, I saw who held his strings.”

“Hela?” Sif asked with a frown creasing the space between her brows.

“No,” Freya said. “It was a dread master: The Eater of Souls, Dormammu.”

Natasha glanced incredulously between Odinson and Peggy. “Did she just say _‘Eater of Souls’_? Did I hear that correctly?”

Shaking his head in confusion, Odinson retorted, “Are you sure? That lacks sense! The Lord of the Dark Dimension has a pact with Asgard dating back to the banishment of Zom. What reason has he to break such an oath?”

“He has a pact with _Odin_ ,” Freya corrected. “And the All-Father is dying. Now may be the only chance Dormammu has of invading.”

Gripping Mjolnir tight, Thor said gravely, “I fear he may yet succeed. Asgard is little match for one of his might without the will of Odin.”

“You would turn tail and run like a cowardly cur?” Lady Sif’s eyes blazed with conviction, her chin lifted in a defiant slant. “We are not so weak!”

“Weak? No,” Thor replied. “Though it would be incredibly foolish to deny that we are vulnerable. Dormammu knows that. Else he would not risk such an attack.”

Freya’s voice interrupted before Sif could snap back a retort, “Then you must stave off his assault. At least until the All-Father awakens, or –” She trailed off, then her tone hardened, “—Or until his power passes on to his Heir. Do _not_ under any circumstances let the Lord of Chaos wield the Infinity Gauntlet. I shudder to think what may be wrought should he bear it.”

“We understand,” Odinson assured her. “We will not fail.”

"So we're just going to ignore the whole part about eating souls?" At that Natasha heaved a sigh and looked mournfully at the two goats munching spindly thistles nearby. “You know,” she said to them, “I thought the worst thing to have happened to me today was you two. Now? Not so much.”

One of them spat a mouthful of chewed up thistle on her shoes.

Looking down at her shoes, she deadpanned, “I take it all back.”

Ignoring Natasha’s antics – she was almost as bad as Yelena, if not worse – Peggy held up a hand to her eye, expression pained. “What a minute,” she called, and they all turned their attention to her. “You said earlier that this _Doorman_ –”

“Dormammu,” Thor corrected her.

Peggy waved that aside, “Yes. Him. You called him the Lord of the Dark Dimension. Does he use portals for interdimensional travel?”

Sif nodded, the motion sharp, succinct. “Typically he uses them to banish enemies to his realm. From what I’ve heard it is...most unpleasant.”

From the way she said it, it was more than just _unpleasant._

“Could they be like the one I saw in Bolivia?” Angie pressed, catching quickly onto Peggy’s line of thought. “Or like what we saw in Flanders?”

“That would explain how he got hold of Serov’s body,” Yelena muttered, and Peggy was glad to see she was no longer smirking at least.

“More importantly,” Peggy asked, and at last drinking from that well seemed to be paying off, “could he open a portal here? To Asgard?”

Sif and Odinson shared a brief glance. “I suppose,” Odinson mused, scratching at his beard with an inquisitive frown.

“Only with a very powerful spell,” Sif added. “Performed from this side to tear a breach through dimensions.”

Knowledge was a fickle thing. Without context it held no meaning, floating like pools of oil slicked atop water. But now Peggy understood.

A cliff by the sea. Ivan Serov carving circles in blood.

Flushed with triumph, she announced to the startled group, “I think I know exactly where we need to go.”

 

* * *

 

If asked _how_ she knew where to go, Peggy wouldn’t have been able to answer. Nor was she any more comfortable on Sleipnir; the only different in this flight was that that she knew which way to tug the reins. Miraculously Sleipnir responded while Angie and Peggy both dug their heels into his flanks and clung to his back for dear life.

Over the howl of the wind Peggy called out to Odinson and Sif, who rocketed along beside them in the chariot, “Now would be a good time to call any backup!”

Odinson slapped the reins, urging the goats to keep speed with Sleipnir. “Already done!”

The sky crackled with thunder as Thor soared overhead, scouting the landscape below and ahead. Behind them came the high whine as though of engines, and when Peggy looked over her shoulder it was to see a sleek aircraft rising through a patch of cloud.

The aircraft came up alongside them, and one of the doors opened to reveal two warriors, one massive with a red beard and clad all in pink, while the other was slender, leaning his hand rakishly on the hilt of his rapier. Blonde hair tousled in the wind, he gave a lazy almost jaunty salute, “Fandral, Hogun and Volstagg: The Warriors Three. At your service!” He pointed to the front of the aircraft and clarified, “Hogun is piloting the ship. You’ll meet him later.”

“How ‘come _they_ get a vehicle?” Natasha shouted, cleaving to the chariot for all she was worth and looking more petulant than usual.

Not that Peggy was faring any better herself. Her stomach was still trying to tie itself into knots.

It certainly didn’t help that Angie was squeezing her so hard around the middle she could feel it through her armour. When she glanced around to see what the problem was, she found Angie staring intently at the aircraft.

Of course. She should have known that would be the case.

Shaking her head, Peggy turned her attention forward and gave Sleipnir a hard jerk on his reins. “This way!” she yelled, banking to the right.

The smell of the sea preceded the thing itself, coarsening the air with salt. Peggy urged Sleipnir down, and he hurtled toward the ground. There upon a distant cliff fires burned, and beyond the sea fell into the endless void of space. Like a beacon the fires guided them down, and Sleipnir landed hard enough to make Peggy’s teeth clack and for all the wind to be slapped from her lungs.

Beside him the others all landed: the chariot with a clatter, Thor with a clap of thunder, while the aircraft lowered itself gracefully to the earth. Clambering from Sleipnir’s back, Peggy paused to fix Angie with a stern look, “Stay here.”

In the sky behind Angie those ravens still followed on swift wings. From where she remained perched on Sleipnir’s broad back, she stared at Peggy and gave an incredulous bark of laughter, “You can’t be serious.”

“I mean it.” Peggy grabbed hold of Angie’s leg and squeezed, tilting her head back to look her full in the face. “Stay with the Asgardian aircraft if you prefer, but please…” She steadied herself with a shaky breath, leaning forward so that her forehead bowed against Angie’s knee, gently pressing against the cold metal prosthetic. Peggy suddenly wished she were on the other side so she could touch _her_ , warm flesh and blood and all. “Please just be safe.”

A hand in her hair, fingers carding through dark strands. The hand stopped when it hit the cloth tied around Peggy’s head. When Peggy looked up again, Angie was smiling down at her with soft eyes, “Go save the world already.”

From where she had just stepped off the chariot, Natasha snapped magazines into her pistols, “Less talk. More fighting.”

Sif drew her shield and sword, “Agreed.”

Pulling herself away Peggy took the lead, climbing up the last of the grassy slope leading to the Cliffside nearby. Behind her the others fell into formation, and the nine of them made their final advance. Peggy grit her teeth and forced herself to not look back.

Atop the cliff overlooking the sea Ivan Serov crouched. The bodies of disembowelled animals had been carefully splayed out around him in a pattern – two cockerels, and a snake that even dead looked like it had slithered onto land from the ocean’s depths. Behind him at the very peak of the cliff the Infinity Gauntlet lay upon the ground, as though it had just been forgotten there. With shaking hands Serov painted circles and symbols on the ground, fingers glistening dark with blood. His own blood. And where the blood touch the earth, flames leapt to life, those same flames that had guided them there, drawing them like insects huddling to the light. In the harsh glow his gaunt cheeks were clearly illuminated. Peggy did not need to drink from a magic well to see that he was already long dead.

He did not seem to notice their approach. He only continued drawing, his milky unseeing eyes fixed and unblinking.

“Don’t let him finish the circle!” Peggy ordered.

At once Thor pointed her hammer, and from it a bolt of lightning leapt through the air, arcing towards Serov. It hit him full in the chest, but even as he fell his limbs continued to twitch with purpose, and his hand dragged across the dusty earth.

The summoning circle roared, the flames surging upwards and searing a violent crimson. The rupture in Serov’s chest where Thor had struck him with lightening widened. Serov’s skin bulged. With a sickening crack his chest split open, peeled back like ripe fruit, and from his ribcage stepped a flaming humanoid creature all in black armour.

Slowly it unfurled itself, rearing back its broad shoulders until it towered. Fire danced where a head should have been, animated, _alive_ , taking the shape of a terrible face.

Stepping forward, Odinson hefted his great axe and commanded, “Go back to your dimension, Dormammu, or you will know Asgard’s fury!”

The flames gathered, swirling at Dormammu’s feet, and when he spoke his voice echoed, rasping like the crack of hot coals down a mineshaft, “Asgard is weak. You lack a ruler. I have waited millennia for this chance, and now the time has come for me to provide such lordship.”

“Odin’s Heir stands with us, Hellspawn!” Lady Sif brandished her sword.

Dormammu’s head swivelled, his gaze landing on Peggy with a heat like standing too near a furnace. “This is Odin’s Heir?” His cavernous mouth ripped into a wide smile and he laughed, a deep cackling noise.

All at once Peggy felt two things. One: the fervent desire that Sif had not drawn attention to her, thank you very much. And two: the severe disappointment that interdimensional chaos lords were so predictably villainous.

An evil cackle? What was this? A bad screenplay for a Bram Stoker film adaptation?

That being said the disappointment quickly evaporated beneath very real terror a moment later.

Dormammu’s hand shot up, the sharp claws of his armour clenching into a fist. Directly behind her in the centre of the group’s formation, she felt a burst of energy. Peggy barely had enough time to glance over her shoulder before an orb of dark matter ruptured, exploding outward, knocking them all clean off their feet.

Peggy caught herself just in time to not sprawl flat on her face, and when she jerked her head up she saw Dormammu striding toward her through fire. Pure darkness writhed up both his massive arms, and he loomed, eight feet tall and wrathful. “I will strike you down, Odin’s Heir.”

Peggy _really_ wished Sif hadn’t said anything.

She was scrambling back when a bolt of lightning shattered across Dormammu’s armour, giving her enough time to stagger upright. With a snarl Dormammu shrugged the blow off and continued forward. Bullets pinged uselessly from his chest, passing clean through the sorcerous flames of his head.

Bellowing, Odinson and Volstagg charged together, slamming their weapons down, one across Dormammu’s shoulders, the other across his opposite knee. The Hell Lord batted Odinson aside with a swift, vicious backhand, sending him reeling. Kicking Volstagg’s axe to the ground, one massive hand crooked and Dormammu’s flames flashed a brilliant blue-white. As if he were a puppet pulled by strings Volstagg was lifted into the air and suspended there. Dormammu reached into his chest, and when his hand wrenched out Volstagg slumped to the ground, leaving behind in Dormammu’s grasp something that smoked pale and ghostly.

“As if your insignificant soul were worthy of my notice!” Dormammu hissed. He clenched his fist, and the soul fractured like glass.

Already they had lost one of their number, and Dormammu hadn’t even broken a figurative sweat.

Shakily Peggy drew the Odinsword over her shoulder. With a broad imperious gesture Dormammu sent a torrent of flame spiralling to her left. Instinctively she flinched away from it, and it screamed through the air where it crashed against Sif’s upraised shield. Whirling away from it, Sif sped forward, Fandral and Hogan flanking her.

Before they could reach him, Dormammu summoned a black orb behind them with a dismissive flick of his wrist. It sucked them back in a miasmic whorl of energy, crushing their bones into a tangle of worthless limbs.

“Is this the best Asgard has to offer?” he sneered, arrogant. “You are not worthy of freedom!”

Holding the Odinsword unsteadily in front of her, Peggy growled at it, “Now would be a good time for you to do your glowy thing!”

The Odinsword remained stubbornly inert and heavy in her grasp.

Useless bloody thing.

Above them the sky darkened with the boom of thunder. Whirling Mjolnir over her head, Thor advanced. The storm gathered, lightning forking down, striking Dormammu left and right. He staggered, one knee buckling and crashing to the ground.

Snarling in rage, he cast a pillar of fire, but Thor deflected it with a stout swing, the hammer knocking the flames aside. The flames almost singed Yelena, who dodged them, scowling fiercely.

“How about we don’t lose any more people?” Natasha said over the shriek of the storm wheeling in the sky. She emptied another clip into Dormammu’s armour before throwing her pistols aside in disgust.

“This isn’t working!” Yelena snapped, doing the same. “Peggy, why aren’t you attacking?”

Peggy grimaced, “We’re having some…technical difficulties!”

“Now is not the time for performance anxiety, Grandma!” Natasha yelled, diving aside to avoid being melted as Dormammu fought Thor and Odinson.

“I’m working on it!” Peggy called back, then gave the Odinsword a firm shake, muttering under her breath, “Come on! _Come on,_ you gaudy piece of jewellery!”

With an enraged roar, Dormammu unleashed a plume of flame, making Odinson leap back, then Dormammu lunged forward and clapped Thor’s head between both hands. His black armour bore deep scorch marks from the lightning strikes. In his furor his flames climbed, spreading across his shoulders, scorching the air until it reeked of blistered ozone. He wrenched Thor’s neck around in a sharp snap.

Mjolnir dropped from her grasp, landing on the ground with a heavy thud. Dormammu flung Thor’s limp body aside so that she crashed into Odinson, and he reached for the hammer.

He yanked.

And Mjolnir refused to budge.

Odinson’s axe landed a mighty blow, and Dormammu lurched back towards the cliff edge with a boiling cry. “What need do I have of such a weapon when I have this?”

From the ground he snatched up the Gauntlet. They all froze, wide-eyed. Cackling, exultant, he tugged the Gauntlet down and –

– It wouldn’t fit over the first ridge of knuckles on his fingers.

“What -?” he snarled, pulling at it furiously.

“Looking for this?”

The blood ran cold through Peggy’s veins.

Through the chaos and confusion of battle none of them had seen Angie sneak along, silent and quick as a dormouse. The Gauntlet in Dormammu’s hands was her piece of tech, while the other was –

Angie slipped it over her wrist, drawing it easily down her forearm. The two stones shone, one at her thumb, the other at her ring finger. Howling with anger, Dormammu started towards her.

She snapped her fingers, and he was shredded into a mist of infinitesimal sub-atomic particles.

An earthquake seized all of Asgard. The stars hid their faces, casting the night in utter blackness.

Odin’s Heir had been among them all along, but it was never Peggy. It was Angie who rode Sleipnir on the Wild Hunt. Angie who thwarted Natasha and Yelena. Angie who gave a limb for knowledge, who battled Ivan Serov – the KGB Wolf, the Butcher – and won.

The two ravens wheeled overhead and settled themselves on Angie’s shoulders, ruffling their feathers. Their sharp cries sounded like laughter, mocking.

Peggy’s hands burned, and when she glanced down the Odinsword was glowing blue. Panicked, she yelled, “Take it off! Angie! _Take it off!_ ”

As though only slightly bewildered, Angie frowned down at the Infinity Gauntlet on her hand. She reached up, started to take it off, then stopped. “Why? Why should I?” For a fleeting moment she seemed to come to her senses, but then the stones glimmered, and she clenched her hand into a fist. “It is mine by right.”

That high-pitched whine had returned. Peggy blinked past the blinding headache, her vision clouding in a haze. In her grasp the Odinsword trembled, willed her forward.

“Please,” Peggy begged, panting for breath, teeth clenched. “Angie, please…”

They were standing together upon the edge of the cliff, blood at their feet, the salted wind stinging their cheeks. When Thor died the storm had died with her, but now the air swirled with a new kind of energy, flecked with power raw and breathing like a living thing.

At the mention of her name, Angie’s face screwed up and she flinched as if struck. “Peggy?” she muttered, and when she opened her eyes they flickered in alarm. She looked down at the Gauntlet, at the sword. The ravens whispered in her ear, grim half-phrases, lines of prophecy and hoarded knowledge. Whatever they said Peggy could not hear, but Angie’s gaze hardened. She grabbed Peggy’s shoulder and pulled her closer. “Do it.”

“No!” Peggy gasped, trying to wrench back. The Odinsword sang, digging into her, compelling her forward.

“You have to.”

“Don’t make me,” Peggy’s voice cracked and she choked back a sob, biting her lower lip. “I can’t –”

The Infinity Gauntlet gave another treacherous gleam, and the air around them hummed with energy, reeling with crackling flurries of power. Angie’s grip tightened, the strength of her hand denting Peggy’s armour until it bent around her shoulder. “Do it now!”

Letting loose a small whimper, Peggy thrust up, and the Odinsword slid between Angie’s ribs as though it were always meant to be there, flooding Peggy with the taste of blood and sickening triumph.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Dear Marvel,  
> Dormammu is OP. pls nerf.  
> xoxo - Roman


	7. Chapter 7

The headache followed even after the longest day in Peggy’s life, striking pins and needles behind her remaining eye with every step, with every too sudden movement. Peggy existed in a state of constant wincing upon the edge of tears, just like Angie’s body had tipped over the edge of the cliffside and disappeared into the salt spray far below.

Of course at this point Peggy had no idea that the longest day of her life was far from over.

Back to the grand halls of Asgard’s palace they had returned to find Odin awake but still weak upon his sickbed. He had enough strength to roll his head and mumble, but little else. Still Freya and his son shared the same palpable relief. Even Thor slumped her shoulders as though she’d been strung up like a marionette all along, dancing along the knife’s edge.

On the other hand Peggy felt like she’d be physically ill when Odinson clasped her by the upper arms and thanked her.

 _Thanked her_. Like she’d done some sort of great service.

Though she supposed she had. In order for Odin to be saved, for Asgard to be saved Angie had to be killed. And wasn't the safety of an entire people more important than one person alone?

Well, wasn't it?

Peggy wasn't so sure anymore.

To make matters worse Odinson had made good on his promise. Off he had gone to Idunn’s garden and returned dutifully with a golden apple. He’d held it out to her, and Peggy had stared down at it glittering in his palm.

How small it looked there. Dwarfed by his massive hand. It had no unearthly quality that she could tell. In fact it look just like a golden bangle hanging from a dead woman’s wrist that jutted from the wreckage of a building in Kassel back in 1943. Dusty. Unpalatable. Not long before she met Angie –

Angie’s body disappearing beneath the wine-dark waves, crashing against the treacherous rocks below. Peggy’s hands slick and still warm with blood. The Odinsword trembling in her grasp, brimming over with a sense of _rightness_ and –

No. She wouldn’t think of that. She couldn’t think of that.

Squeezing her eye shut against the roil of nausea in her gut, Peggy turned her head aside. She was leaning against a carved stone balustrade. Odinson had seen to it that each of them – Peggy, Natasha and Yelena – had received only the most royal of apartments Asgard had to offer after the battle. They were supposed to all be resting, but apparently to Asgardians resting after a battle meant drinking too much in the name of fallen comrades.

At this point Peggy would rather drink alone. And to be honest she had done just that, as evidenced by the empty tankard on the railing beside her.

With a sigh she leaned her elbows on the balustrade overlooking the wondrous city sprawling before her, and glanced mournfully into the empty tankard as if that would compel it to be suddenly full again.

Yelena had tried keeping her company, but Peggy had sent her running with an ugly look. Regardless of Yelena’s intentions, Peggy wanted nothing to do with her or Natasha at the moment. She’d heard Natasha whispering to Yelena outside her door earlier, asking when would be a good time to discuss the topic of amnesty. Yelena had dragged her away from Peggy’s door and back to the mead hall, or whatever ridiculous name the Asgardians had for it.

Then at last alone Peggy had stripped of all her armour, flinging the blood-coiled pieces away where they clattered and clanged in a forgotten corner. Shivering, she had pulled a silky robe on, then draped a heavy blanket from the foot of her bed over her shoulders before retreating to the balcony. Where she still sat, despondent in a claw-footed chair beneath the cool night sky tinged with the far off dawn.

To her other side the golden apple sat, gleaming in the starlight. Peggy toyed with the handle of the tankard, mouth twisted in thought before she snatched the apple up and glared down at it.

It didn’t feel like a prize. It felt like a price. The way her eye had felt when she had handed it over to Mímir. Heavy and feather-light all at once.

She seriously mulled over the thought of chucking it over the balcony. If she were lucky it would hit a bystander walking below. If she were very lucky it would hit Natasha.

Behind her propped against the back of the chair was the Odinsword. She had tried leaving it with the pile of her armour earlier, but it had dug in its claws until she snatched it up and carried it with her even now. Touching it made her skin crawl, but it was better than the alternative, which was a blinding headache that almost brought Peggy to her knees.

When she rolled the apple between her palms, the Odinsword gave a strange twinge. Scowling at it over her shoulder, she growled, “Maybe I should throw you over the balcony instead.”

If a sword could grumble petulantly, then the Odinsword just did.

“Somehow I don’t think it would go very far,” a voice said above her.

Scrambling upright, Peggy drew the Odinsword in a flash of blue streaking through the dark air. The light emanating from the blade illuminated the space around her, casting a long-limbed figure perched on the rooftop in a ghostly glow.

Seeing who it was, Peggy spat, “What are you doing here?”

Loki unfolded himself and leapt down onto the balcony, graceful as a jungle cat. There he walked the balustrade like a balance beam, heel to toe. “They let me out of my cell, of course. After all,” he smirked, “Ragnarok is over. Isn’t it?”

“So I’m told.” Peggy said. She didn’t lower the sword however, keeping it trained on him. If it made him uncomfortable in any way, he didn’t show it.

The Odinsword’s tip did waver though. She may have had a little too much to drink.

“Oh, excellent!” He smiled fully now, revealing too many teeth, like a dog baring fangs. “Then you can put that down once and for all.”

He gave a lazy gesture to the Odinsword, which sent an answering rumble through the ground, shaking the columns that flanked the door to Peggy’s quarters. Peggy swayed on her feet, but not from the alcohol. At the thought of putting the sword down, she suddenly had to fight back a fresh wave of nausea clutching at her stomach, and the blade seemed to burn bright as a tongue of flame.

“I said,” Loki’s voice started off soft, then without warning he kicked aside the tankard on the railing and snarled, “Put. It. _Down._ ”

Gaze narrowing, Peggy tightened her grip on the sword instead.

For a moment they stared at one another over the Odinsword’s length. Then Loki broke the silence with a laugh more akin to a giggle, small rasping huffs of breath.

“You can’t, can you?” he cocked his head, hands behind his back. From his place on the railing he towered above her, crowned in wintry moonlight.

“Tell me why,” Peggy demanded.

“Must I spell everything out for you?” he sighed. In one liquid motion he stepped down from the balustrade until the tip of the Odinsword pressed against the gorget glinting against the black folds of his robes. “The Odinsword cannot be released until it has fulfilled its purpose. The cycle must end.”

Frowning, bemused, Peggy shook her head. “I don’t understand. I killed her. The cycle is already over.”

“Killed her?” he chuckled, incredulous, as though Peggy had just said something witty. “She’s not dead.”

Swallowing past an obstruction in her throat, Peggy said nothing. She dared not hope. Hope was dangerous.

“You don’t believe me?” Loki feigned a wounded look.

“You are a god of lies. Of course I don’t believe you.” Peggy tried to make her voice steady and hard, but it quavered in her mouth like a winged thing, trapped behind bars.

He stepped around the blade, and Peggy did not follow him with it as she had before. “The cycle must be completed, ergo the Odinsword does not _kill_ its victims. It reassembles them so that they may fight again. And again. Ad infinitum. It’s just,” he tapped at his chin contemplatively, “normally its foes are more – how should I put this? – _durable._ ”

Here he gestured with both hands at Peggy herself, and gave a grimace. She half expected him to comment on her unfashionable clothes, at the blanket that had slipped from her shoulders to the ground, and the gossamer nightgown that brushed the tops of her feet. “Humans are so –” he waved his hands around, “- _squishy_. Short-lived. The last foe of Ragnarok took almost a thousand thousand years to reassemble in their own realm. But humans?” He snapped his fingers. “Just like that.”

When still Peggy did not respond, he held out his hand. “I can show you. Right now.” His eyes were hypnotic, never blinking, never breaking contact.

Slowly Peggy slid the Odinsword back into its sheath, and she took his hand.

 

* * *

 

 

As far as inter-world travel went, Peggy much preferred this to the Bifrost. At least Loki’s means of transportation – whatever the details may have been – didn’t end with her flat on her back and winded from the force of the impact. Instead there flashed a brief moment of intense dizziness in which the world spun like a Catherine wheel before righting itself with a sudden jerk.

Peggy blinked. They were in a hospital. Back on earth, unless she was very much mistaken. An English speaking country according to the writing on the signs. The murmur of two nurses passing by confirmed American accents.

Despite their strange attire and the massive sword strapped to Peggy’s back, nobody paid them any attention.

“A simple charm,” Loki explained without her asking, as though he could read her mind. “To them we look completely normal.”

A father pushing his small son – no more than seven or eight – in a wheelchair kindly admonished the child when he pointed with a gasped, “Look at that sword, Dad!”

“Don’t be silly, Thomas,” the father murmured, gently pulling the boy’s hand down and aiming an apologetic smile at Peggy.

Loki watched them roll away. When Peggy gave him a curious look he shrugged. “The Odinsword is somewhat resistant to spells. I can make it look like a handbag to most, but to others it remains a sword.”

“Those pure of heart?” Peggy muttered dryly.

“Something like that.”

She snorted and asked, “Is it a cute bag at least?”

“You look very fashionable,” he assured her, then held his hand out for her to enter a room to their left.

Arching a wary eyebrow at him, she nonetheless pushed open the door. Upon seeing what was inside, she forgot how to breathe.

There Angie lay on a bed of white tissue, hooking into an IV drip at the crook of one elbow, chest rising and falling beneath a hospital gown like a shroud. She had both legs. Made of flesh and blood. Her pinkish feet poked out from beneath the pale gown. Peggy crossed the space with hesitant steps. If this too were some sort of spell, it was of the cruellest ilk. Angie’s wrist was warm and solid when Peggy touched her, and when her eyes fluttered open, all the air Peggy had been holding in her lungs escaped in one long sharp burst.

Angie blinked blearily through the glittering motes of dust suspended in the sterile air like a curtain. She looked up at Peggy standing over her, and screamed.

Nurses rushed in, pushing Peggy back, restraining Angie against the bed as she flailed her feeble limbs and tried to scramble away into a hidden corner of the room.

“What’s wrong -?” Peggy pressed, panicked, trying to move around a nurse herding her out the door. “Angie -!”

“Ma’am, I need you to leave,” the nurse ordered sternly, blocking Peggy’s progress forward, hands raised.

Peggy rose up on her toes, peering over the nurse’s head as two others administered a sedative to Angie, slowly calming her wild thrashing. “I want to see her!”

The nurse’s expression hardened. “She’s in no condition to be seeing anybody right now. You’ll have to come back later.”

“What happened?” Peggy demanded, not bothering to keep the harsh note from her voice.

“I’m not authorised to share that information,” The nurse shut the door, locking the sight of Angie away behind it. “Ma’am, how are you related to our Jane Doe?”

“She’s my -!” Peggy’s mouth snapped shut with a click. For a moment she glowered down at the nurse, and when the sudden urge to draw the Odinsword washed over her, she stormed off down the hall, fists clenched.

Hands on hips, she paced a little way off, breathing heavily. From a perch on a windowsill Loki watched her with hooded eyes, his fingers held in a sculpted position against one knee.

She rounded on him. “You told me she was fine!”

“I never said she was fine. I said she was _alive._ ” He shrugged off her glare with a roll of his willow shoulders. “I think you underestimate the trauma involved in being ripped apart atom by atom and then reassembled, while your last memory is of being violently stabbed in the chest with a legendary god-sword.”

The Odinsword never felt heavier across her shoulders than it did now, as though it threatened to drag her down into the very bowels of the earth.

“How long?” she snapped, feet restless, fingernails carving tiny half-moon crescents into her palms.

“What? Until she recovers?” Loki gave a particularly derisive snort. “Who knows? Humans are so weak. A lifetime, most likely. Short as that may be.”

Peggy didn’t know which was worse: thinking Angie was dead, or knowing that Angie was alive like this. Dragging a hand through her hair, she squeezed her lone eye shut, the muscles of her jaw bunching until her teeth ached.

“But there is another way.”

When Peggy opened her eye, Loki was looming right in front of her. She hadn’t heard him move at all. He carried himself in exact opposition to her own tirelessness, with an uncanny stillness. Her lips parted, but she didn’t need to voice her interest. Not when her pleading gaze said it all.

With a flourish of his fingers, the Gauntlet appeared in his hand in a trail of thin grey smoke. Staring down at it, Peggy realised that it actually hovered over his hand, never once touching his skin. Where it levitated closest to him, the flesh mottled to a cracked pearly blue-white like ice.

He held it forward. “Put it on.”

Down the hall she could hear soft whimpers from the room she’d just left. Expression growing steely, Peggy pulled the Gauntlet over her knuckles, and one of the stones winked.

 

* * *

 

 

“Milk, Miss Carter?”

Peggy jerked. She dropped the cup offered to her, spilling hot tea all across the floor, scalding her feet and ankles.

“Oh, dear!” Mr. Jarvis exclaimed softly. He leaned down to pick up the shattered pieces of porcelain, waving Peggy away. “I’ll handle it.”

But she wasn’t even looking at him. She was staring straight ahead.

A familiar glow of sunlight was caught in Angie’s hair. Out on the balcony of their penthouse apartment in New York, Angie was waving away a few pigeons strutting along the railing, ever hopeful for a stray snack. Two massive ravens swooped down and perched behind her, cocking their heads. Watching. Waiting.

Rising shakily to her feet, Peggy staggered over to the balcony door and stepped out into the same pool of sunlight.

Angie glanced up, and her smile warmed Peggy from head to toe.

There was no Odinsword. No headache. No Gauntlet. Peggy blinked – both of her eyes.

Grabbing Angie by the front of her shirt, Peggy yanked her up for a hard kiss.

Behind them Mr. Jarvis cleared his throat delicately. “Well, then,” he murmured to himself as the kiss continued for some time. Averting his gaze, he carried the pieces of the teacup into the kitchen for disposal. “I suppose I’ll make the tarte Tartin by myself.”

As he returned with a towel in hand to mop up the mess, the telephone rang.

Angie pulled away from the kiss with a little frown of confusion, but she was smiling all the same. “What was that for?” she asked, adding hastily, “Not that I’m complaining or nothing.”

With a huff of laughter Peggy shook her head and pressed another kiss to the upturned corner of Angie’s mouth. “It’s nothing, darling.”

“Miss Carter?” Mr. Jarvis’ voice called from the other room. She looked over her shoulder to find him holding out the receiver. “There’s someone on the line for you.”

Going stock still, Peggy steadied herself with a deep breath, reluctant to leave until Angie pinched her hip. “Go on, then.” Angie urged her on with a grin. “I’ll help make a tart. You take the phone.”

Swallowing, Peggy nodded. At the railing the ravens watched them both with liquid black pensive eyes.

Going back into the apartment, Peggy took the phone from Mr. Jarvis and raised it to her ear. “Carter speaking.”

_“Hey there, Grandma.”_

Peggy closed her eyes and bit her lower lip. “Let me guess, Natasha,” she opened her eyes again and watched Angie tie a pink floral apron around her waist. “You want amnesty.”

 


	8. Chapter 8

Four things always happened:

1) Peggy always broke the teacup;

2) the tarte Tatin was always delicious;

3) Peggy always hit the pothole; and

4) Angie always died.

Although perhaps ‘died’ wasn’t the right word. It’s just – it felt like killing to Peggy, so to Angie it must feel like dying.

The manner in which Angie died and Peggy ran into the pothole and dropped the teacup always changed, but inevitably the outcome was the same. She was distracted by Yelena in the car and couldn’t swerve in time to save that left wheel. She was arguing with both her stubborn passengers and managed to run into it yet again. She couldn’t dodge Dormammu’s relentless flames fast enough – never fast enough, never strong enough – and Angie managed to get her hands on that damn Gauntlet. Peggy’s wrist twisted and wrenched like the motion of the blade in Angie’s stomach, and the teacup slipped from her fingers. Loki appeared at her side as she stared through the glass into Angie’s hospital room and offered her the Gauntlet. Another chance at recursion. Again. And again. And –

But at least the tarte Tatin was delicious. No matter that the nineteenth time Peggy ate it -- flanked by Angie and Mr. Jarvis’ congenial banter – she cried right into the half melted ice cream.

Both stared at her in shock, at an utter loss at what to do. Until Angie placed a warm concerned hand on Peggy’s back – shoulders heaving with little sobs – and asked, “What’s wrong?”

Shaking her head, Peggy wiped away the stray traitorous tears and shoved another mouthful of tart into her mouth. “It’s delicious,” she sniffled.

The next time Peggy didn’t blubber over the tarte Tatin. Instead she drew her gun and shot both of those damn ravens when they alighted upon the balcony. Angie squawked in alarm and made a fuss over the bodies of the dead birds, but Peggy knew they would pop to their feet and fly away as soon as none of them were looking.

“You could’ve missed and shot me!”

“Don’t be ridiculous!” Peggy snapped at Angie. “I don’t miss!”

Seeing that the situation was about to escalate, Mr. Jarvis tried his best to diffuse the whole debacle. “Come now, Miss Martinelli. I was going to teach you how to make a tarte Tatin.”

“Or you could make something else for a change,” Peggy growled, still gripping her Walther PPK.

“What the hell has gotten into you?” Angie barked, punctuating each word with a jab of her favourite red-handled screwdriver.

Pinching the bridge of her nose, Peggy took a deep breath and forced herself to put the gun down. “I just don’t particularly feel like having apples. Can’t you make something else?”

“No!” Angie threw down her flathead with a glare. “If I want to make a tarte Tatin, then I’ll damn well make a god damn tarte Tatin!” She stormed to the kitchen with a gruff, “C’mon, Fancy! You get the pink apron!”

“My favourite colour,” he mumbled, avoiding Peggy’s gaze and following Angie into the kitchen as though he were traversing a minefield.

Right then the telephone rang, and Peggy snatched it up knowing exactly who was ringing and why.

Of course the tarte Tatin was delicious in the end. Peggy ate it almost viciously, stabbing the crust with her fork, eyes sharp enough to gouge straight through the plate.

Angie wasn’t the only one who died. The others weren’t constant variables – not like the spilled tea and that god forsaken pothole – so Peggy could never quite tell who would go and how. That remained all very relative.

On one occasion Natasha fell over the edge of the cliff while trying to yank Angie out of harm’s way, and as she fell Peggy heard laughter. As though after all she had lived through Natasha thought it nothing short of amusing that she died here of all places.

“It’s yours,” Peggy said into the receiver the next time everything was reset.

“I – what?” Even across the line Peggy could hear Natasha’s confusion, see the little wrinkle in her brow.

“Amnesty. It’s yours.”

Silence. And then, “How did you -?”

“Know? I have my ways.” It was best to leave it at that. Peggy had tried twenty-eight timelines ago to tell the others about all of…. _this_ to even more disastrous results than usual. She herself had almost been decapitated by Sif. “But before I give it to you, I need you to do something for me.”

“Now _that’s_ more on the lines of what I was expecting.” If anything Natasha sounded relieved.

“I need you to accompany me to another planet.”

Another long period of silence. “Come again?”

“I’ll explain in Flanders,” Peggy brushed Natasha’s confusion aside and hung up, joining Angie and Mr. Jarvis in the kitchen where the sickly sweet smell of caramelised apples stewed. At least they weren’t cooking pork.

On another occasion Peggy grew desperate – more desperate than normal anyway – and in her haste to get to the Gauntlet, she had her right arm and half her face charred off by a torrent of flame from Dormammu’s fist. As she lay there, stewing in the stench of her own cooked flesh and Dormammu towered above her ready to deal the killing blow, she almost wished he would succeed. But then the Lord of the Dark Dimension shattered into a million million pieces, and Angie stood behind him wearing the Gauntlet, encircled with red veins of power like a fury incarnate.

After that particular timeline Peggy couldn’t bear the thought of eating pork; the smell of it cooking turned her stomach. She’d rather eat more tarte Tatin.

For all that Peggy was genuinely surprised at the wrench in her gut the first time Yelena died. In her haste to get to the Gauntlet Peggy lost her footing in the chicken’s blood Serov had smeared across the earth. Above her Dormammu reared, clawed hand outstretched to deliver the killing blow – and it never did come. Instead there was a blow to her midriff as Yelena tackled her and she grunted with the impact, flung sideways out of the way.

A torrent of dark matter roared by, and Peggy muttered a hurried, “Cheers!” to Yelena.

While she staggered to her feet however, Yelena remained face down on the ground. Blinking dumbly Peggy reached out and turned her over. “You bloody idiot,” she growled thickly down at Yelena’s lifeless body.

The very last person she wanted to feel sad for was Yelena bloody Belova. And yet here she stood.

In the next timeline Peggy pushed a bottle of chilled vodka into Yelena’s hands as they stood together in the women’s changing room at SHIELD’s headquarters.

Yelena glanced from the frost-dusted bottle to Peggy and back again. “Whatever it is, I didn’t do it.”

“Oh, shut up,” Peggy said gruffly, stuffing another pair of socks into her bag and avoiding both Yelena and Angie’s curious gazes. They had come here to harass her into letting them accompany her on the trip to Flanders. This was not the reaction they had expected.

Now Yelena just looked suspicious. “Is this is a hormonal thing?”

Peggy aimed a glare at her. If anything that seemed to relieve Yelena, whose shoulders relaxed. “For future reference, I don’t actually like vodka.” She gave the bottle a little shake.

“Isn’t that a sin or something?” Peggy tightened the drawstring on her canvas bag with a sharp jerk.

Rolling her eyes Yelena drawled in a thick exaggerated accent, “Yes. In Motherland KGB shoot us for not drinking to effigy of Papa Lenin.”

“I wish. It would certainly solve a heap of my troubles,” Peggy muttered. “What _do_ you drink, then?”

“Gin.” Angie answered, leaning against one of the lockers with crossed arms.

Eyebrows raising, Peggy asked, “Do I want to know how you know that?”

Angie scowled at Yelena. “No. It involves Cuba.”

At that Yelena smirked, and immediately Peggy regretted giving her the vodka in the first place.

The next time Yelena saved her from a life-threatening situation – in which neither of them died, thank heavens – Peggy didn’t get her vodka. She got her gin instead.

Peggy would like to have been able to say those were the only instances in which someone saved her sorry skin from the hungry jaws of death. Luckily nobody remembered the time Natasha had to kick one of Odinson’s goats to keep it from trampling Peggy to a pulp. Death by goat was _not_ how Peggy wanted to go.

The only recursion that drove her to drink however was the one hundred and seventh.

Now that Peggy knew gods existed – in some capacity at least – she suspected there must have been one with a streak for cruel irony. That could be the only explanation. One hundred and seven was too much of a coincidence.

That was the timeline in which _everyone_ died. Save herself. And Loki.

Dormammu reached the Gauntlet before Angie, and they all fell before him. One by one. First Yelena. Then Odinson. Then Sif and the Warriors Three. When he swept Thor aside with a mighty blow that crumpled her armour straight into her chest, Mjolnir slipped from her fingers and landed on the blood-splattered earth with a dull thud. With a triumphant peal of laughter he reached out for it. Even wearing the Gauntlet it would not move for him, though it gave a great groan from the strain.

Seeing his back turned, Peggy drove the Odinsword between the plates of his armour. Dormammu reared back with a high shriek of pain, like the screech of white iron over too-hot coals. Snarling he wheeled about, delivering a clout that sent Peggy reeling and tasting blood.

Spitting out a tooth, Peggy stumbled upright only to have Dormammu grab her by the front of her armour and lift her into the air, trying to squeeze the life from her. If this was what being hung was like, then it was supremely unideal. Her feet dangled, and on the ground below the Odinsword gleamed. As Peggy gasped for breath and beat her fists against Dormammu’s forearm in vain, she glanced over his shoulder and her eyes widened.

Crawling through the wreckage, a bloodied and broken Natasha stretched out her hand towards Thor’s hammer. And lifted it.

A bolt of pure blue energy struck Dormammu square in the back, ripping through his armour where the Odinsword had weakened it before. He dropped Peggy, who went scrambling for the sword again. Wielding it more like a club, she hacked at Dormammu’s arm. The blade bit into his shoulder, but did not sever the limb in time. Not before he lit Natasha like a Christmas tree.

There was only so much a magic hammer could do.

Later when Loki approached Peggy with the Gauntlet – as he always did – she was using the Odinsword to stay upright. Everyone was gone, and Peggy was swaying on her feet, exhausted and feeling a little singed around the edges. She was pretty sure the ends of her hair were still smoking.

Loki held out the Gauntlet. “When at first you don’t succeed –” he began to say.

But Peggy cut him off. Heaving the Odinsword over her shoulder she slouched away with a muttered, “I need a drink.”

Eventually Peggy lost count. She began to not care. And then she forgot what it felt like to care at all.

Mr. Jarvis handed her the teacup and she deliberately poured it on the expensive Persian carpet, crushing the porcelain underfoot.

Angie and Yelena confronted her at SHIELD headquarters, demanding to accompany her to Flanders, and were puzzled when she responded with a simple, defeated sigh. “As you like.”

The Asgardians openly gaped when she walked directly to the Odinsword and hefted the blade without breaking stride.

She skipped Mímir’s Well, leading the group directly to the cliffside as Serov was making his final preparatory incantations.

She wore armour like a second skin these days, the weight a comfort rather than a burden. One of her few comforts left.

Always the same. Always Loki haunted her step with golden apples and the promise of better things that never dawned.

This time though – this time she put the Odinsword down and let Angie keep the Gauntlet. It was the only thing left to try. At least under the mantle of the All-Father Angie would be safe.

Normally after the events of the battle Odin tried to bestow upon her an apple, which Peggy always refused. Therefore she thought that when she was summoned to the throne room the same events would transpire.

How wrong she was.

Peggy had never seen the throne room whole and pristine before. It was always a shattered ruin whenever she arrived to draw the Odinsword. When she entered this time her step faltered.

Every surface glittered. The tall room was awash with warm light and a ubiquitous hum. There at the centre of it all Angie sat upon a cross guard throne, draped all in gold. And when she looked up her eyes were like the glance of sunlight across glass.

“You have something of mine.”

The sound of her voice made an involuntary shiver roll down Peggy’s spine. Dark as distant thunderclouds. Yet she approached the low-slung dais as though drawn there, compelled. Her armour weighed heavy across her shoulders. Or perhaps that was the Odinsword strapped across her chest, digging in until she could hardly breathe.

“What might that be?” Peggy asked, fearing she already knew the answer.

A crown glittered in her hair and the Gauntlet gleamed on her hand, the twin stones winking at thumb and ring-finger. “Your services are no longer required, Margaret Carter. Return the sword, then return to Midgard. You have no place here.”

Peggy’s mouth went dry. Of all the ways she had expected this to go, this wasn’t it. “And what about Loki? He promised me a golden apple.”

Angie’s face remained impassive when she announced. “The God of Lies had no authority to offer you such a gift. He will remain imprisoned and pay for his transgressions, as will all who oppose us.”

This was not Angie. This was something else entirely. Twisted by power and something else. The All-Father.

“The sword is yours. You can have it.” Reaching over her shoulder Peggy drew it, and the blade was already emitting a hard blue light. In a last desperate attempt to find some last vestige of her, Peggy asked, “May I ask of you a boon?”

The All-Father inclined her heavy crowned head. “Very well. What boon?”

“A kiss.” Peggy tried to keep her voice steady, but it came out as a croak.

She searched the All-Father’s gaze for something, anything. A small flicker of recognition. But there was none.

That was all the confirmation Peggy needed.

The All-Father rose from her throne and stepped down to where Peggy stood. She was still the same height – slightly shorter than Peggy – but her presence felt more massive. She moved with weight, each step a trembling echo through the air. She reached up, palms bracketing Peggy’s head, drawing her down, and pressed a cold kiss to Peggy’s forehead. Right at the edge of her hairline. Like a liege lord kisses a dutiful knight.

Peggy thrust the Odinsword upwards, and a gasp ripped from Angie’s lips. The hilt was slicked not with blood but a golden ichor. Tightening her hands around it, Peggy grit her teeth and her eyes burned. Angie’s hand shot up to fasten around Peggy’s neck. The Gauntlet pricked the soft skin there like claws. Even as the life drained from her – the Odinsword sticking clean through her chest – the stone of Power flashed as Angie clenched her hand, slowly crushing Peggy’s windpipe. Until her body slumped forward, fist still clutching furiously at Peggy’s throat.

Gasping for air, arms trembling under the weight of Angie’s body, Peggy realised this was the only time she wasn’t sorry she did it.

She stood there at the base of the dais with Angie’s still warm brow leaning against Peggy’s shoulder for so long her knees threatened to buckle.

Later that day Peggy didn’t tear her gaze from Angie lying on the hospital bed. She didn’t need to look to know that Loki was holding forth the Gauntlet once more. As he always did. She could feel it, the chill of his skin, blued and icy from such proximity to the Gauntlet’s unwavering power.

Sometimes – in the calm sunny warm space before she received the call for amnesty from Natasha – sometimes Peggy found herself wondering it that was the real power of the Gauntlet. Revealing a person’s true self. Loki, the ruthless liar with skin like a king’s ransom: cold and glittering. Peggy, throwing caution to the wind, rushing headlong only to drown and flail. And Angie –

Reflexively Peggy rubbed at the bruises at her throat, indentations from the Gauntlet. Wisps of frost curled into the air from Loki’s fingertips, wreathing the Gauntlet with an inaudible whisper.

“No.”

At that Loki’s expression took on an air of polite puzzlement. “What was that?” His tall shoulders leaned forward as though to better hear her, though she had absolutely no doubt that he’d heard her the first time.

Her mouth set into a line, less grim than it was resigned. Weariness hung about her like a coat, long and wet and heavy.

He wasn’t making her repeat it for _him._

All gods really are cruel.

Peggy turned away. From him. From the window. She turned away and as she walked the Odinsword scraped at her footsteps, “I’m done. No more.”


	9. Chapter 9

Every day to work Peggy carried the same umbrella. The outfits and handbags changed, but the umbrella remained the same. Regardless of whether it rained. And when it did rain she never used it, preferring to hasten from one awning to the next holding a previously read newspaper over her head.

Nobody commented on it. Not directly to her in any case. Behind her back the agents murmured curiously, but they always scrambled back to work when they heard her coming. The umbrella heralded her approach, tapping against the floors, wielded like a cane, black and furled and austere, or otherwise balanced in the crook of her elbow as she busied her hands with reports or cups of tea.

Once Howard had attempted to joke about it. “On a day like today, I wish I’d brought one of those myself,” he grinned with a pointed look out the windows where the sun cooked the Manhattan sidewalks.

In response Peggy had only given him a level look. “Why did you call me here, Howard?” she asked, voice hard.

Smile faltering, he cleared his throat. “I was hoping to have a private word before the board meeting.”

“If you want a word, come to my office,” she said shortly, and she turned to leave, knuckles white around the dark metallic hook handle.

These days she couldn’t stand going to the lab. Howard must have known that.

Still he let her go. Though he didn’t come to her office. Instead he walked with her to the board room later that day, jogging to catch up with her clipped pace down the hall. “Hey, Peg! Wait up!”

She didn’t.

“Where are your papers?” she asked, glancing briefly at him but never breaking stride. The umbrella clicked with every alternate step, echoing down the halls of pale grey stone and glass. Her own papers were tucked under one arm.

“In here.” He jabbed a finger at his head. “But that’s beside the point. I need to warn you about something.”

Peggy gave a quizzical little hum. “Oh?”

“You’re walking into an ambush, Peg.” He lowered his voice to a rushed, grave whisper. “You’ll always have my vote – you know that – but those guys in there?” He gestured to the doors they were quickly approaching. “They’re a nest of damn vipers.”

At the door they stopped, and through the smoky glass could be seen the dark shapes of people within. Peggy looked up at Howard and shifted her grip so that she could reach for the door. “Thank you. Your concern is duly noted. Shall we?”

Shaking his head in disbelief, he followed her inside.

“Good morning, gentlemen,” Peggy greeted the room as she crossed to her seat at the head of the long table. “Agent Romanoff,” she said to Natasha, who nodded in return.

Sitting down with Howard directly on her right and Natasha on her left, Peggy leaned the umbrella against the table within easy reach beside her. She flipped to the agenda on the first page of her papers. “I hereby announce the August 1966 board meeting opened at 09:02 this day, the twenty-first. Minutes of the last meeting. Any amendments?”

She glanced down the table, and when the other four members of the board shook their heads, she scribbled her signature on a page. “Minutes of the previous meeting accepted. Now onto: Matters Arising. Agent Romanoff,” Peggy turned to Natasha. “Thank you for attending this meeting. I’m pleased to inform you that your naturalisation application – with the aid of SHIELD – has finally been accepted. I would like to take this time to formally welcome you as a full-time member of SHIELD and as an American citizen.”

Natasha opened her mouth to reply, but before she could get a word in edgewise, someone else spoke.

“The board never voted for this,” one of the members – a silver-haired ex-Marine by the name of Brent Lewis – interrupted. “I request a vote.”

Leaning back in her chair, Peggy casually pulled the umbrella with her, draping her hand over the handle. “As you like, Mr. Lewis. Those in favour?”

Only she and Howard raised their hands. Natasha also raised her hand, but under the table so only Peggy could see.

“Those opposed?”

The remaining three board members raised their hands. Mr. Lewis did so looking a little too smug.

“Excellent!” Peggy said without batting an eyelash. “As Chairman and Managing Director, I reserve my right to cast an extra vote, bringing this matter to a deadlock. In such an instance the matter is resolved by the decision of the Chairman. Namely: _me_.” She looked at Natasha. “Welcome to the team.”

“You can’t just do that!” If Mr. Lewis’ face were to get any redder, he would turn into a tomato.

Peggy stroked her thumb over the glossy black handle of her umbrella. “You should read your contracts and charters more carefully, Mr. Lewis.”

His mouth jerked open as though her were going to lash out, but instead he growled, “In light of recent events, I demand an audit of this board! You can’t harbour every ex-Soviet spy without proper due diligence, and expect us to roll over! And after your claims of a run in with an _alien race_ , not to mention the sudden disappearance of our Head of Robotics - !”

Peggy’s gaze darkened, her grip on the umbrella tightened, and when she stamped its tip against the ground, the walls and floor trembled.

“Do you think this is a democracy?” When she spoke her voice was low, dangerous. The very air shivered. “I will do whatever it takes to ensure the wellbeing of this institution and this country with or without your approval. You’ve never had any power, Mr. Lewis. It just took you this long to realise it.”

A hush fell over the room and the tremors died down, during which Howard looked nervously between Peggy and the others. Clearing his throat, he began weakly, “Should we move on to the Health and Safety report now?”

 

* * *

 

“Hey, Peg!”

As Howard approached Peggy and Natasha in the hallway after the board meeting, Natasha clamped up immediately and eyed him askance.

“Not keeping secrets from me, are you?” he asked, only half joking.

“Of course not,” Peggy assured him, giving Natasha a stern look. “She’s just slow to trust, is all.”

“ _Slow to trust!_ After I voted for you and everything!” He laid a hand over his heart as though wounded. “So, you’ll trust your old nemesis but not me?”

“No,” Natasha replied flatly, her expression giving away nothing. “But I _will_ trust the woman who pulled me to safety from a pillar of eldritch flame.”

Howard just blinked at them. “She did what now?”

Lips pursed, Peggy perched both hands atop the hook-handled umbrella. “You wanted something, Howard?”

“Yeah. Among other things I want to know exactly what the hell happened up in space.” When Peggy opened her mouth, he waggled an admonishing finger. “And don’t think for an instant I buy that horse hockey in your official report! I know there’s more you’re not telling me!”

Peggy’s voice went cold, cold as her eyes. “Believe what you like. I have nothing more to say on the matter.”

He studied her long and hard, and for a moment it seemed neither would back down. Then he threw his hands up in defeat and sighed. “You’ve -!” He cut himself off then continued with a determined look. “You’ve changed.”

“Everyone changes, Howard.” Her hands shifted over the smooth black handle in her grasp. She noticed him scowling at the umbrella as though he wanted to snatch it from her and break it over his knee, but the last time someone tried touch it the poor junior legal aid had to be taken to the hospital for third degree burns on their hands. Word travelled fast after that.

Giving an irritated huff, Howard grumbled, “Well, good job in there. You handled Lewis like – like someone who handles things.”

“Like a _handler?”_ Natasha supplied, a sarcastic twist to her grin.

“Exactly.”

Peggy snorted and shook her head. “Just doing my job. You know that.”

“You might consider _not_ doing your job every once in a while. You _are_ allowed holidays, you know.” Howard reminded her. “Hey, you should really take the rest of the day off. Go home. Enjoy a long weekend. Be with the kids.”

The shadow of an expression passed over Peggy’s face, and it looked almost pained. But then it was gone. “I’ll go home at five.” It seemed Howard was about to interject and be annoyingly insistent, so she added, “That’s earlier than I normally do.”

And really that was all he could ask for.

 

* * *

 

“You’re home early.”

If there was one thing Peggy had learned, it was that Yelena Belova failed almost as miserably as Peggy herself when it came to the homely arts, but that Dottie Underwood excelled at them. Sometimes Peggy thought it must have been nice, being able to switch between masks with such ease, being a savant in the kitchen, being good with the kids.

And if there was one thing Peggy would never have expected to know: it was exactly that.

“Howard’s idea,” Peggy admitted, slinging her handbag over an arm of the coat hanger in the foyer of her penthouse apartment.

Yelena’s eyebrows rose. She dusted flour from her hands onto the pinstripe apron tied across her waist. No matter how many years Yelena had been living here as a bizarre sort of _au pair_ and in-house guard-dog, Peggy would never get used to seeing her look so domestic. “And you listened to him?”

Peggy sighed. “He was… _insistent_.”

Incredulous, Yelena gave a light snort and rolled her one eye. “Good for him.”

Just then there was a high shout from the living room, followed by the slap of quick feet over floorboards. Around the corner the twins barrelled, small and dark-haired and nearly identical at this age. Upon seeing their mother standing there in the foyer they froze. They took their hands from one another where Elizabeth had a fistful of Richard’s shirt – evidence of their roughhousing – yet remained huddled close.

Offering them a tired smile, Peggy knelt down and pressed a kiss to the top of each head. Richard had ink smudged across his cheek, and Elizabeth had snarls in her hair. While they loosened up at the gesture and began their more raucous behaviour anew, Peggy stiffened.

Curious Richard reached out for the umbrella, the tips of his fingers grazing it, and immediately Peggy jerked it out of his grasp, shooting to her feet. Disappointment flooded his eyes when she snatched the umbrella behind her back, but he was soon distracted.

“Dottie, I’m hungry!” Elizabeth complained loudly.

To the kids Yelena was always ‘Dottie.’

“Lucky for you that dinner’s ready, then.” Yelena’s voice went high and cheery, and she beamed. It was an expression Peggy knew well on her, but somehow it always seemed more genuine with the kids. Even with an eye-patch. “Would you like to help me set the table?”

“No!” They both groaned.

Yelena’s smile broadened and she swooped down to scoop up a child under each arm. “Wrong answer!”

Peggy watched her carry them towards the kitchen to shrieks of laughter, and not for the first time she wondered how on earth Yelena did it. She made dealing with them look so easy. It wasn’t that Peggy _meant_ to be distant. She just had to be constantly wary because of –

She gripped the handle of the umbrella so tightly her fingers ached.

Teeth clenched, Peggy carried it into the house. It travelled with her everywhere: resting against the dining room table while they ate, hanging from a hook in the bathroom while she showered, even leaning against her bedside table after she helped tuck the children in and was reading over reports in bed before going to sleep.

Unlike Howard however, Yelena never needed to ask. Nobody who was with her in Asgard needed to ask.

 

* * *

 

In the dead of night Yelena shook her awake. Peggy jerked from her restless sleep with a start, aiming an instinctual jab of her fist that Yelena dodged, smooth as you please.

“They’re gone!” Yelena hissed, and even through the darkness Peggy could see the worry painted on her face.

It took Peggy’s sleep-addled brain a moment to piece together the situation, but when she did her eyes widened and she leapt out of bed. Seizing the umbrella, she didn’t bother putting on a robe. “You’re sure? Remember that time they hid from us in the pantry?”

The twins had thought it hilarious to hide from them just for the satisfaction of knowing that Peggy and Yelena would both tip over the apartment in a wild hunt. The only reason Peggy had found them at all had been because they couldn’t stifle their giggles among the cans of beans and creamed corn.

“Yes, I’m sure!” Yelena ran a hand through her hair, gathered into a loose braid at the base of her neck. “I checked everywhere.”

Storming out of her bedroom, Peggy emerged into the hallway. The door to Yelena’s room stood ajar, as did the door to the twins’ room. “When did you notice they were gone?”

It wasn’t the first time Peggy had seen Yelena walking the hall barefooted, wearing an ankle-length lace-ruffled nightgown like a Victorian ghost, but it _was_ the first time Peggy could remember her looking so vulnerable. Her hands bunched into the fabric at her waist, anxious. She had obviously left the eye-patch on her nightstand, revealing a mass of scarred tissue over one side of her face. “About fifteen minutes ago. I woke from a chill in the air. Something felt off, so I checked in on them, and there were gone.”

“No signed of tampering at any of the entries?” Peggy asked sharply, eyes scanning the hallway for anything out of place.

Yelena shook her head. “None.”

Peggy was one step away from turning the house upside down. “What about -?”

She froze. A breath of wind stirred the hem of her nightgown, creeping across her calves like a cat arching its back. Shifting her stance, Peggy pulled on the umbrella’s handle and in her grasp it lengthened and shimmered blue, casting the hallway in an eerie light. 

Beside her she could hear the click of a gun being cocked. Peggy didn’t want to think where Yelena had been hiding that just a moment before. Any vulnerability fled when Yelena was glaring down the snub-nosed barrel of a Wildey .475 Magnum.

Then a voice spoke from the nursery, a voice Peggy hadn’t heard in three years.

“Is this the way humans treat old friends?”

The Odinsword flashed as Peggy whirled around, aiming its tip at Loki. He sat amidst a pile of stuffed animals. Without looking at them he picked up a fuzzy grey wolf and studied its glassy eyes.

“You don’t have friends,” Peggy growled, moving warily into the room, Yelena hot on her heels with her own weapon trailed on Loki.

In faux shock he covered the ears of the stuffed wolf. “And after I’m just trying to help! Shockingly rude of you!”

“Where are the children?” Yelena spat, finger on the trigger. A gun certainly wouldn’t kill him, but it would sting.

“Oh you mean the collateral?” Loki waved his hand, nonchalant, and tossed the wolf over his shoulder. “They’re safe.”

“Safe _where?_ ” Peggy pressed, and as her grip on the Odinsword tightened, a fine shudder passed through the air.

“With the Lady Sif.”

Frowning in confusion, Peggy gave a small shake of her head. “ _Sif_ is working with you?”

She’d believe Howard had stopped drinking before she believed that.

“Heavens, no!” Loki chuckled. “I just wanted to see the look on her face when she woke up to two strange children in her quarters. She has no idea I’ve even left Asgard. No, I’ve come on my own with glad tidings.”

Quick and fluid as smoke, he rose. The pale lights of the city at night slanted through the camed windows, striking bold shadows across his face and shoulders. “I do hope you kept your armour, Miss Carter.” He turned over his hands like a magician revealing a white dove, except one was holding a golden apple, and the other suspended a familiar Gauntlet.

Peggy must have still been asleep; surely this was a nightmare. 

He smiled. “Your adventures are far from over yet.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've kept the names of the twins the same as in Disaster Mother purely because I can't think of them as having any other names now. If Marvel ever does give us their real names and they AREN'T Richard and Elizabeth, I'm going to be Very Disappointed. 
> 
> Also: Mr. Lewis is Darcy's asshole grandfather.


	10. Chapter 10

Golden apples tasted absolutely nothing like normal apples.

“What _is_ it like?” Yelena mused aloud more to herself than to the others as she shot a shadowy shade point blank in its chest, making it dissipate into whirling ash and bone and flecks of ectoplasm. “I can’t quite put my finger on it.”

The three of them were traversing the plains of Hel, laying waste to the armies of the dead that clawed at them in droves. As far as the eye could see bare trees stretched to an endless horizon, branches a thicket of mournful briars that wept the dead’s regrets instead of amber sap. The landscape was broken only by a single unadorned black gate with no walls to speak of, on the other side of which – according to Loki – Hela’s city sat.

At least that was what Peggy saw. Apparently Yelena saw something else entirely, as did everyone who came here. Gloomy arches and the spires of gaping broken cathedrals adorned with bodies that swayed from the neck, feet bare and red and dangling.

Peggy preferred her forests, to be perfectly honest. Yelena’s vision of Hel sounded positively ghastly.

“Remind me why we’re here again?” Peggy asked Loki, ignoring Yelena. The Odinsword sliced through a spirit’s ghostly shoulders, cleaving it in twain. It had been almost four years since she’d worn her old Asgardian armour, but she’d worn it for so long in the past that it felt just as natural as her blazers and skirts.

In response Loki stabbed two shades with his golden spear, his expression a marriage between boredom and excitement. Or perhaps ‘boredom’ wasn’t the right word. ‘Lazy’ was more accurate. Like a smug cat.

“To save a piece of Odin’s soul from Hel’s greedy grasp, and thus save your beloved,” he answered simply, adding a little sing-song note to the word ‘beloved’ which Peggy frowned at.

Without even looking Yelena shot two spirits shambling behind her, and they splashed to the ground like a heap of old wet rages. “It tastes familiar…I’m sure I’ve tasted something like it before.” She sucked on her teeth as if to tongue the memory of golden skin there.

“Pheasant?” Loki supplied helpfully. “Or – what’s that common fowl you humans like so much? Chicken?”

“No, it’s not that.” As they pressed onward towards the great gates of Hel, Yelena changed out the magazine for her pistols to fight the last wave of undead protecting the black city. “It’s more like… _dismay._ ”

As soon as Yelena said it, Peggy couldn’t help but silently agree. That was exactly what golden apples tasted like. Though she wouldn’t have said they tasted ‘familiar.’

She supposed it was fitting for their mission, life-giving apples that tasted like the absence of hope.

“ _Lasciate ogne speranza, voi ch’intrate,_ ” Peggy muttered under her breath, and Yelena gave her a curious look. Rolling her eyes Peggy said, “Yes, I know a spot of Italian. Don’t look so surprised.”

“Your accent is terrible.” Yelena clicked the magazines in place.

“So I’ve been told. Loki!” Peggy suddenly snapped. “Duck!”

Just as he dropped down, she slashed the Odinsword in a broad horizontal attack. On her hand the Gauntlet flashed and the Odinsword swept a gleaming arc of crimson that cut a legion of ghosts to ribbons.

Loki straightened with an appreciative look at her handiwork over his shoulder. He appeared far less appreciative when she jabbed the Odinsword at his chest and growled, “I advise you start talking. _Fast._ ”

If there was one thing a Trickster God excelled at, it was talking.

“Odin’s Heir and Successor to the throne of Asgard is born with a piece of Odin’s soul –” Loki began, but he was cut off by Yelena.

“As much as I’m enjoying story time –” she gasped, grappling with two ghouls, managing to throw them off and shoot them each in the neck. “Could both of you _please_ try some multitasking?”

With an aggrieved sigh Peggy dragged herself back into the fray. “Keep talking!” she yelled at Loki, who followed, spear in hand.

“Right. As I was saying.” He decapitated a shade that then burst into ash. “When you killed Odin’s Heir, the piece of Odin’s soul went to where all Asgardian souls go when they die. Namely: here.”

Peggy rammed her shoulder into a gaunt shadow of death before driving the Odinsword down its throat. “So, you mean to tell me Angie’s been living for almost four years – _soulless?_ ”

“Well, not _soulless_. Not completely in any case. She has most of a soul. We’re just going to get the missing piece back so that Asgard literally doesn’t go to Hel instead.” Loki deftly dodged three ghosts, disappearing and reappearing behind them in a wisp – like the trail of vapour over ice. By the time he reappeared behind them, the spirits were already impaled on his spear and dissolved into bursts of soot. “Honestly I thought you’d just moved on these last few years. Let the old flame die. That sort of thing.”

“I haven’t _moved on_.” Peggy sneered, striking down a skeletal ghost with a particularly vicious and artless chop of the Odinsword.

“She really hasn’t.” Yelena said, her voice almost as flat as her gaze, firing rounds with nonchalant ease.

Canny eyes flicking between the two of them working in tandem, he grinned. “Of course. My mistake.”

With a growl deep in her chest, Peggy gave a sharp jerk of her elbow, jamming it into a shade that was clawing at her back while two others clutched her legs and waist. At her hand the Gauntlet blazed red, and in one fell strike she drove the Odinsword into the ground. The earth there cracked, rent with great fissures that splintered out in all directions and vented gouts of wine-dark energy that scoured away the last of the spectral army into dimly glowing embers.

Panting, Peggy tugged the Odinsword free and rounded on Loki. “Why didn’t you tell me this sooner? Why let me take the Gauntlet and go?”

“I tried!” Loki insisted with a laugh, a half-chuckle like a burr caught between words. “But every time you put the Gauntlet on you went back to save her before I could get a word in edge-wise!”

“Then tell me _before_ you give me the Gauntlet!” Peggy snarled.

He shrugged, leaning the spear on his shoulder. “How was I supposed to know? I was stuck in time! Destined to re-enact the same series of events until you got it through your thick skull that you don’t know best!”

“Do you think I wanted to be catapulted into the Groundhog Day from Hell? It’s not like I had a choice! This damn thing feeds off emotions!” She waved the hand wearing the Gauntlet, which also happened to be the same hand wielding the Odinsword. When the blade pulsed a sullen blue, she added with a scowl. “This bloody thing also!”

Yelena interrupted. She didn’t holster her weapons, keeping her narrowed gaze fixed on Loki. “What I want to know is: why take the children?”

“To make sure that _someone_ actually listened.” He glared at Peggy. “For once.”

“And why do you care?” Peggy shot back. The Gauntlet still pulsed with energy that twisted up her arm and along the Odinsword like corrosive veins. “Isn’t this what you want? Isn’t this all a part of your cycle?”

“It’s not my cycle,” he said darkly, and for once there wasn’t a trace of humour on his face.

Suddenly Peggy had to remember that this was the God of Lies and that to feel sympathy for what most certainly was an act on his part was _dangerous_. Jaw clenched, she breathed deeply and forced herself to loosen her grip on the Odinsword’s hilt. The veins of energy dissipated along with her anger. Slowly. Simmering just beneath the surface.

“I hate to break up this little pity party,” Yelena interjected, looking over her shoulder, “but it appears there are a lot more dead people here than we originally expected. Which shouldn’t be that much of a surprise. In fact –” She squinted. “I think I killed that guy in the first place. But that might just be my poor depth perception speaking. Either which way, I think we should _vamoose_.”

Peggy’s eye twitched and she shot a sharp glance in Yelena’s direction, but Yelena was purposefully not looking in her direction. Over the last few years Peggy had noticed Yelena picking up little mannerisms that had originally belonged to Angie, and whenever she did Peggy would upbraid her. At least, as much as an ex-Soviet assassin and spy could be upbraided. ‘Vamoose’ was definitely something Angie would say.

Yelena already spent as much time with Peggy’s kids as Peggy did herself – if not more so. The thought of her being a replacement for Angie galled.

They rushed to the gate, which squatted low and broad across the parched ground. Much to Peggy’s disappointment there was no inscription over the top. Instead it was plain, glossy, completely unadorned. When looking through it she could see no change, just more thorny forests endlessly embrowning and encrusting their branches with sorrows. All around them the horde of shambling spirits drifted closer.

“How do we -?” Peggy began.

“The Gauntlet.” Loki answered simply. His air of unflappable poise had vanished. Now his knuckles whitened around the shaft of the golden spear.

Sliding the Odinsword back into its sheath across her back, Peggy flexed her fingers. The plates of the Gauntlet clinked together, delicate sounding as slender glass. A dubious look at the twin stones at her knuckles, and then she pressed her palm flat against the base of the arch.

Nothing happened.

“Oh god, not you too.” Peggy groaned, head slumping forward so that her chin rested on the lip of her breastplate. “Why can’t any of my magical items ever just _work?_ ”

“Ok, remember that time all our souls were almost devoured by an interdimensional Hell-Lord?” Yelena’s fingers nervously grazed the triggers of her pistols, and she backed closer to the gate. “This is worse than that time.”

“If it’s any consolation,” Peggy said, clenching her Gauntleted hand into a fist and giving the gate a fruitless punch, “I’m fairly confident that apple means we’re immortal for the duration of our time in Hel. So they’ll tear us to pieces, but we’ll survive.”

“Thanks! I feel so much better!” Yelena drawled.

The three of them crowded at the base of the gate, and Loki hissed, “You need to muster up some conviction!”

Unfortunately all Peggy really wanted to do was punch him. _Conviction?_ Easy for him to say. He wasn’t the one caught in history’s worst time-loop.

Once upon a time she would have said conviction was her most sterling quality. But those days were long gone.

“I’m trying!” Peggy ground the words through her teeth. As if to emphasis this she slapped the heel of her hand a few times against the archway to no perceivable effect.

The dead closed in around them. Close enough that Peggy could feel them, the chill rising off their shadowy, aberrant forms preceding them. Close enough that Yelena began shooting.

Rather than join her however, Loki leaned in close to Peggy, crowding the space over her shoulder, lurking. When he spoke his voice was low and oily and sent an unpleasant shiver down her spine. “Think of your children.”

_Bloody bastard._

It was Peggy’s last thought before the Gauntlet flared a blinding red, bleeding into the black grainless stone beneath her hand. The archway shimmered as though with a fine silvery net, its nodes winking like stars through a poisonous vapour.

“Go! Just like I told you!” Loki yelled, grabbing hold of Yelena and pulling her around.

Holding her breath as instructed, Peggy dove through the arch. The net caught on her skin, moonlit thorns digging deep and painful, latching onto something in her chest and giving a fierce yank. It felt like an eternity, that one step through the veil. Hela coiled her net, her robes of doom for the mortal haul, and slowly pulled Peggy soul through her mouth, a long winding slither, colubrine-thin. Peggy held her breath, tethered her spirit to its corporeal form, and prayed the golden apple had done its work.

They fell through the archway, landing in a heap on the other side. Groaning, Peggy rubbed at the small of her back as she lurched to her feet. She was getting too old for this.

A voice – a thing of dark wild places, stone gripped through with moss, the scent of henbane and heather and the rustle of hounds through the thicket.

“Tell me – why shouldn’t I kill you now?”

The first thing Peggy noticed when she whipped around, hand reaching automatically for the hilt of the Odinsword jutting over her shoulder, was a low distant murmur like thunder. Two massive hounds of pitch black with eyes that burned a dim amber crouched at the base of a throne draped all in crushed silks. Atop it a woman clapped the raven’s head armrests in her clawed hands. She perched, all sinuous and lithe, a crown of hemlock and antlers branching from her skull, rams horns curling at her sharp cheeks.

Immediately Loki put aside his spear and gave a low flourishing bow from the waist. “My dear Hela. How wonderful to see you again.”

Straightening slowly, both Yelena and Peggy trained a wary eye on the woman and the guards flanking her, which appeared to be suits of armour animated by smoke. The rumbling rose in pitch and Peggy realised it was in fact the hellhounds growling, hackles bristling.

Peggy lowered her hand from the Odinsword, and the growling subsided. The hounds didn’t even spare a glance for Yelena’s pistols.

Hela had no eyes that Peggy could see – just a voidless black cloth wrapped where her eyes should have been – but somehow she knew when Hela’s attention focused on her. The weight of that gaze felt like a leaden blow.

“They’re here with me,” Loki said smoothly, gesturing to Peggy and Yelena. “We’ve come to make a deal.”

“And why in the Nine Realms would I give you, of all people, a piece of Odin’s Soul?” Hela’s voice scraped, like the clip of cloven hooves over fallen branches, or the sloughing of moonlight through trees.

“Oh, it’s not for me!” Loki insisted with an easy laugh. “No, no. It’s for her.”

Peggy’s mouth went dry when Loki grabbed her by the shoulder and pushed her forward. She stumbled a step, armour rattling like a tin can, and suddenly she wished she could be anywhere else. Or that her armour was more substantial and made of diamond-wrought tungsten. Hela’s head tilted, antlers scraping the smoke-hazed air. With a clearing of her throat, Peggy managed a little curtsy and immediately felt incredibly foolish.

“And what will you give me, Champion?” Hela asked.

“I – uh –” Confused, Peggy looked around at Loki, but he refused to meet her gaze. Finally she directed her attention back to Hela and admitted, “I don’t understand.”

The Queen of Hel remained stock still on her throne, coiled. “Nothing is free. A soul for a soul. In most cases this is the bargain struck. But you ask for not just any soul. You ask for a piece of the All-Father’s soul, and for that I will not part unless the offer is princely. So,” Hela leaned forward, and at last Peggy could see the gleam of eyes, like the reflection of a predator’s gaze in the night. “What will you give me? Or rather – _who?”_

Casting her mind about frantically, Peggy tried to think. “I have nothing but what you see before you.”

Before Hela could speak, Loki added softly to the side, “That’s not entirely true.”

Peggy stared at him incredulously. When she realised what he was talking about, her expression hardened. “The children aren’t with Sif, are they?”

“Not exactly, no.” With a flourish of his fingers they appeared, slumbering and suspended in air, held in stasis until he needed them revealed.

“Absolutely not!” Yelena snarled, aiming both pistols at him. When Peggy didn’t say anything, Yelena glared at her. “Peggy! Tell him!”

Instead Peggy was deathly quiet. Her hands clenched into fists, and when she spoke her voice was soft, dangerous. “You knew this would happen. From the beginning.”

He wanted her desperate enough to give them up. To sacrifice everything for –

Loki shrugged, and the twins drifted down, slow and gentle as falling leaves, to rest on the ground before Hela’s feet between the massive paws of hounds. “I had an inkling. Hela’s deals always end this way. Tit for tat, as you might say.”

It was his smirk that did it. And the snake-like gleam of his skin in the flickering torchlight. Peggy’s hand flew to the hilt of the Odinsword and she drew it in a smooth gleaming arc. Its blade pulsed a deep violent red.

“Tit for tat?” she repeated hollowly, advancing upon him. “A _princely_ offer?”

Holding up his hands, Loki’s smile faltered. He stepped back. “Now, now. Let’s be reasonable.”

The Odinsword sang as Peggy swung it through the air, and Loki leapt sideways to avoid it. The blade gave a great resonating clang against the earth, and still Peggy advanced.

“I think I understand why the cycle never ended now,” Peggy said, her eyes dark. She struck out with the Odinsword again, a savage swipe that scorched the air, forcing Loki to jump backwards. “Because I never quite got around to killing _you._ ”

In a wisp of smoke Loki multiplied into a dozen identical clones, each moving away in different directions. With a feral snarl Peggy’s hand clenched and the Gauntlet flashed yellow.

Time stopped. And the clones all disappeared, leaving only Loki behind.

Scrambling backwards, he said desperately, “If you don’t strike this bargain, all Asgard will fall into the hands of Hel.”

_“Good.”_

Peggy raised the Odinsword over her head and brought it down, planting it between Loki’s ribs to the sound of thunder. He clutched at the blade, hands bloodying the edges. As he died she twisted the sword in his chest, and his body dissolved into pale ash.

Panting, Peggy leaned upon the crossguard of the sword. The blade was flushed with blue now, and the feeling that washed up into her was something like – resolution. Like the last piece of a long-suffering puzzle set into place.

Peggy dragged herself upright, sheathing the sword over her shoulder once more. She turned back to the throne. Yelena knelt beside the sleeping twins, testing their temperatures with her wrist at each brow.

“They’re fine,” Yelena assured her when Peggy shot a weary yet concerned look at them.

For a brief moment Peggy closed her eyes and allowed herself a small trickle of relief. Then she turned to Hela, who watched her from her grand seat. The guards flanking her had not moved, though Peggy could feel them watching her, the smoke wheeling from the joints in their sleek spiked armour.

Hela’s eyes gleamed, green and gold as a nocturnal animal’s through the gloom. “Insufficient,” she hissed.

Peggy didn’t know whether she wanted to laugh or cry.

Raking a hand through her hair, the Gauntlet caught on a few strands and she had to carefully pry it free. Lord, she must look a fright. Shoulders slumped, she opened her mouth.

“Take me instead.”

Peggy blinked. It were as though the words had been stolen off the tip of her tongue. Shocked, she gaped down at Yelena. “You can’t –” she choked.

Pushing herself to her feet, Yelena brushed her hands together and offered a sad smile. “That’s not your decision to make. Don’t think I’m doing it for you. Because I’m not.” She added petulantly.

She couldn’t stop herself from glancing down at the twins though.

With a huff of watery, incredulous laughter Peggy pressed the palms of her hands against her eyes out of sheer exhaustion. When she raised her head, sniffling, the words _thank you_ caught in her throat, Yelena was already gone and something bright glimmered in the palm of Hela’s hand. And then Hela clenched her fist, and the light went out.

“The bargain,” Hela held out that same hand towards Peggy, “is struck.”

Hesitant, Peggy stepped forward, reaching out. Hela lunged, grabbing hold of Peggy's hand and even through the Gauntlet Peggy could feel the weight of her touch, heavy and cold as a lodestone. This close Peggy still couldn’t see Hela properly, as though the edges of her smudged like charcoal over a canvas. Her mouth glinted, bloodied and dark, and for a fleeting instant Peggy could hear the distant cry of hunting horns astride the forests, the rush of speeding arrows, the hunt and death a taste on the wind.

When Hela released her and withdrew, she left a slender radiant crescent behind in Peggy's hand.

Peggy cradled the piece of Odin’s soul in the palm of her hand, the Gauntlet glimmering golden as a gemmed reliquary as the soul flowed into it. Then she knelt down and picked up the twins, one in each arm, silently thankful that they were still so small, and walked away. The cycle – at last – finished.

 

* * *

* * *

 

It was raining as hard as Angie had ever seen it. Daylight was dwindling to its final hours, a grey smear along the city skyline. Bundled up as she was in a woollen jumper beneath her baggy overalls she still gave a light shiver and reached for a scarf. At one point it had been pink, but now it was so grungy with oil it was the bare memory of pink. Still she wrapped it around her neck, tucking the ends safely away, and continued working on the 1961 Thunderbird Convertible.

Currently she was working in one of her father’s auto shops in Brooklyn, and she’d stripped back the engine until she’d gotten to the timing belt. It wasn’t nothing too fancy. Most of the time she just wished she had better toys to play with, to be frank.

Where were the fun bits? She’d heard those warbirds were a good laugh, and lately she’d pawed through the local library’s entire collection of books on planes from the last war. What she wouldn’t give to get her hands on one of them.

Strangely they felt more familiar. Even in picture format. But she tried not to dwell on that too much. Made her head hurt to think about it.

And in any case this was good honest work. Mind-numbingly boring work. But honest. And she’d be damned if she turned that down.

Rain hammered down atop the tin roof. Over the din she could just barely hear Andy Williams crooning away on the old stereo set on the other side of the shop. Reaching out to loosen the mounting bolts holding the belt tensioner, Angie hummed idly away to _Can’t Get Used to Losing You_.

These were the times she liked best. When her father packed up early on a lazy Saturday evening, leaving the shop empty for Angie to do as she pleased without interruption.

At least, that was usually how things went. Turned out fate had another idea.

Out on the road a car pulled up to park, sleek and black as a hearse. Initially Angie merely glanced at it appreciatively – it wasn’t often she saw a genuine 1963 Bentley S3 around these parts unless they were stolen – but when a woman stepped out of the car Angie did a double take.

If the car was out of place, this woman certainly was as well. Dark hair streaked with grey at the temples gave her a look that could only be described as _august_ , and that wasn’t a word Angie used lightly, no sir. Or maybe it was the way she held herself. Walking with purpose, yet each step eerily silent over the pavement, high heels ghosting over the line she walked.

It was pouring rain, sheets of the stuff coming down from the sky, and yet the woman couldn’t afford an umbrella to go with that fancy car? She just walked right through the downpour, cool as you please, soaked to the bone before she got to the entrance of the garage.

For a moment the woman hesitated at the open door, then she stepped firmly inside. As though she had to steel herself, back ramrod straight, eyes dark and piercing.

Clearing her throat, Angie wiped her hands on the front of her overalls. “Car trouble?” she asked. “I can get one of the guys, if you prefer?”

In Angie’s experience, most people didn’t believe she could assemble a deck of cards let alone an engine.

The woman stared at her for a moment, then shook her head. “No, actually.” She seemed to collect herself, then forged on. “I came here to see you. Well, to see if you wanted to grab a bite to eat, honestly.”

Crisp unmistakable British accent. That was unusual in these parts as well. Not unheard of, but odd enough a fact for Angie to tuck away.

Angie blinked dumbly at her for a moment. “Oh!” She scratched the back of her head. When was the last time she was asked out by gorgeous strangers that popped up out of nowhere? “Wait a tick – do we know each other?”

At that the woman let out a bark of laughter, and her expression was an honest to god ray of damn sunshine. Angie wanted to slap herself in the face for thinking something so unbelievably cheesy.

“In another life, perhaps.” The woman’s face relaxed into a soft smile, and Angie’s breath caught in her throat. She reached out to grasp Angie’s hand. “Peggy. Peggy Carter.”

“Trust me, you don’t want to shake hands with –” Angie began to laugh nervously, waving her oil-blackened hand around, but Peggy took it anyway, her grip firm and warm and familiar.

They stood like that without a word. Heat seemed to lance into Angie’s arm, searing up her shoulder and into her chest. With a sharp inhalation Angie clenched Peggy’s hand so hard she was sure she could feel tendons creaking, but Peggy made no indication of moving away any time soon.

In that surge of heat it all seemed to rush back.

_“English?”_

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "Not my idea to do this."
> 
> My original intent was to finish the series with "The Dartboard for Witches." Unfortunately (or perhaps fortunately, depending on you point of view) I was convinced by a good friend that I should write another sequel where Peggy got to swing around a big sword and wear armour and be a badass. And so from the very beginning "The Twin-Fingered God" was the shark to my Fonzie. 
> 
> I can't in good faith say that I didn't enjoy it, though. Because I did. Immensely. 
> 
> Thank you all. I hope you enjoyed everything. This series has been a lot of fun.


End file.
